


Mindoir Matter

by Recidiva



Series: Fracture Planes and Hot Chocolate [7]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Neurodiversity, Romance, Smut, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-14
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-07-12 07:47:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 15
Words: 92,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15990803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Recidiva/pseuds/Recidiva
Summary: This is a continuation of the story "Of Kittens and Broken Things" from an idea generated in the chapter "Trial and Error" where Drala'tem and Senar imagine what they would do with time travel.This is what they would do. First they had to create time travel. That took up a lot of time.This is an AU, reading "Of Kittens and Broken Things" first would be recommended.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Cara's parents chose their new names and were inspired to travel to Mindoir after watching "Song of the Sea" and deciding they wanted to live in a new place where they could live close to the land and create their own myths, adopting Irish accents and a tendency toward blarney. They didn't see it as running away from Earth, which they loved, but running toward a new adventure together, fully committed.

Senar watched five-year-old Cara Fanning with his earned and cultivated reverence for ‘now.’ Her eyebrows were drawn together in focus, her arms held out to keep herself steady as she tried to walk some line she imagined on the ground. She had been picking and eating the heja berries that grew in ornamental abundance near a standing spire of granite he had carved to resemble a Celtic menhir. At four years old she had prosaically named it the ‘Meeting Stone.’ They were beside a pond graced by multicolored pastel lilies, the serene water surrounded by trees from dozens of worlds. Unfortunately, none bore cupcakes. He had to limit his arboreal symbolism to avoid detection of obvious anachronism or impossibility by casual observers and a gifted botanist in the form of Cara’s father. Each tree had its own memories of who she had been newly twined with who she was. The stone had meaning to him beyond meeting. He had traveled back millions of years and brought it forward from land that would someday become Ireland. He had carved hollows in the interior with his words of prayer in Drell sigil and filled them with pristine sand gathered from the same timeframe in the location of the home of the future Tuelon clan on Rakhana. He had not left evidence of his incursion, replacing stone and sand with duplicates, claiming and keeping the Originals. He invoked the carved litany as he watched her chase her joys through sunshine and shade. ‘There is a soul and when you sense them, follow them, lead them, cherish them, love them, for the choices you will make together will be greater than the choices you could make separately. Through them, you will be Whole.’

Their heritage and destiny were merged and mated in plain sight as well as in symbol-rich depths. Set in stone. Living, growing and bearing fruit. He called to her using the name he had given her at her birth “Seleia, lunch is prepared.”

She already had several names; Cara, Lal, Seleia. She was growing into being able to know his name. He had been ’Nar and now S’nar to her. His Soul Name was now defined by her joyous smile when she first saw him each day as “He Who Dances Upon Her Shores.”

It newly occurred to her to ask for the story of her name, though she was distracted by her attempts at physical balance. “What does Seleia mean?”

The word meant ‘Hope’ in Drell, elaborately so, as hope was ever evolving. She often accused him of explaining it wrong because his answer was different each time she asked. He had told her that was because she was different each time she asked.

She loved mysteries and complexities but grew frustrated when she could not grasp all things immediately. In her opinion, he was an excellent teacher but his appreciation of purposely occult complexity did not suit her. There were things that were not easily defined or grasped and her name was only one of the things he had chosen and provided that was so. He often provoked her fledgling-filigree wrath deliberately for the surge of purely parental warming humor it produced in him. She did not like unclear answers that did not hold still for examination but her wrath did no harm, his teasing generating fireworks-worthy green-eyed disapproval of his refusal to make everything as easily comprehensible as physics.

She rarely paid sufficient attention to achieve memory retention or comprehension by Drell standards or even according to what was possible for a human her age. She had curiosity that grew as sweet and scattered as the berries. She was pure potential without the need for application, her enthusiasm for ever-flowing information as charming as her inability to focus upon it.

He had been concerned that her acute perception would make her childhood a time of suspicion on her part and elaborate manipulation on his, but she was pastorally oblivious to significance in many ways. She had no need for the hypervigilance that had been a defining characteristic of her traumatized counterpart.

He did not want his Seleia to develop hypervigilance. He would supply whatever vigilance was required to fulfill the mission his Drala'tem had given him.

He imagined if he called her to him and told her solemnly “Seleia, I am a time traveler and you are the curated focus of all my efforts. We must be prepared for what is to come” she would kiss his nose and say “Don’t be silly, S’nar. Lunch is coming! You said!”

Although the stone, the trees, the composition of the colony and her life in it, the pond, the lunch and each of his thoughts all qualified as elaborate manipulation, he had not anticipated enjoying it so much.

He encouraged her to splash in the shallow, safe cove of story and instruction he provided, deep sea and riptide never experienced. He protected her, kept any potential threat beyond her perceptions. She was so heedless of danger that he imagined if a Rachni appeared, she would want to pet it and demand that her S’nar bring it to her so she could make friends. If he cautioned her that it was dangerous, she would possibly look at him with supreme disappointment, huff in frustration and ask him if he had thought that maybe it was just hungry and needed a snack, chiding him for overlooking the fact that they had plenty of food. He might do it to see what happened before resetting time and preventing any Rachni invasion upon his sacred ground. He was not willing to predict that she would not end up with a devoted Rachni pet.

Seeing Cara Fanning in any iteration sufficiently guarded, properly entertained and demanding his company and service to the point that she would run the distance between their homes and bang on his front door with entitled impatience between their daily scheduled engagements was therapeutic.

The woman she had been had loved the sound of ocean waves. The child she was loved the canticle of story. It was like the atmosphere of Mindoir, surrounding her and sustaining her life, but she could not take it all in at once. She could only draw in so much breath before she let it out in fanciful, magical exhalation, transformed in element. She had and did experience the sounds of wave and story most often as accompaniment, experientially drowned out of her conscious awareness by her thoughts but missed if absent.

She was invested with innocent and open generosity and love, sharing those with him each day through effusive thanks and ebullient laughter, her always-glorious eyes free of shadow. When she ran to his front door she always brought him wildflowers she discovered along the way or treasures such as stones or feathers she had gathered on walks taken without him, telling him she wished he had been there with her. She always brought questions. Her parents answered her questions of course, but his Seleia always wanted more information and he always gave it to her. Her S’nar and her parents were her triangulating stability, the parallax of their viewpoints granting her depth of perception. Watching her immersed in simple berries and balance, dancing in white light as he experienced the dazzling and rich prismatic appreciation of the same circumstances was a privilege he treasured.

He told her “When a Drell is Whole, their Body and their Spirit work together. When a Drell is troubled, their Body and Spirit are separate.”

“Ooooh! Dad’s been teaching me about emulsions. So… maybeeee your body’s like water and your spirit’s like oil and you have to… shake them up?”

Mirth flavored his answer “Yes. Just so.”

“Maybe jump up and down?” She demonstrated the ease of the solution to battle sleep enthusiastically, then realized she had lost her concentration on her pretend line. It seemed she had concluded that as she was not Drell, this story had little to do with her. Good. He was pleased that she was so Whole and untroubled that it never occurred to her that dissociation was possible in humans. Accepting the loss of her game as the price of Drell philosophy, she shrugged and then spun around in an imbalanced, joyous circle, arms flung wide with berry-dyed palms open.

Mock skepticism backlit his tone “Perhaps.”

She stopped suddenly, faceted-sharp emerald eyes narrowing at him in belated accusation of denying her a clear answer, saying in exasperation “But what’s a Seleia?”

“There are moments of a Body, moments of a Spirit that speak of themselves so strongly that they can be heard by the other. For the Body, a moment of Seleia could begin with a cloud moving aside to reveal the sun on a cold day. Perhaps the Body did not know it was cold until warmth reached it. Physical warmth is experienced only on the skin, but something else may move profoundly through the Body and then to the Spirit. It is a physical and emotional sensation like a stone falling in wide and deep water, ripples spreading across the surface, the stone passing from light and air into dark and cold, sinking fast, soon gone. If one is not awake to the possibilities, the opportunity to experience Seleia’s gifts will be missed. Not all warmth does this and the Sun does not cause Seleia each time, but it is a Signpost and a Rightness. A Truth. Being mindful of it becomes meditation, creates practice, grants a Path to a life well lived. We have no control over sun or cloud, but we are all capable of light and shadow in our thoughts and actions. We can learn to recognize and apply the gifts of Seleia. For the Spirit, there are moments when an idea or an action captures our attention and causes fascination. When we experience moments of meaning that involve virtues such as kindness, courage or brilliance, Seleia of the Spirit can call to the Body to take actions to make those experiences our Truth. We are potentially cold, hungry or ignorant when we do not recognize, acknowledge and satisfy our needs. We are potentially cruel, blind and deluded when we do not observe, acknowledge and serve the needs of others. We diminish our potential for growth and good when we do not honor moments of Seleia and add their inspiration to our hopes and prayers. When I first saw you my Body and Spirit knew I wished to make you part of my life, to weave together truths that had suddenly become possible. You are my living Seleia.”

She still thought her name had nothing to do with her, struggling valiantly to find a context that suited her mindset at the moment. She looked up at the sky, the sun briefly behind clouds “Soooo… if Drell jumped up and down more… they could be like… Seleia Dressing. An emulsion!” Thrilled with her synthesis and mastery of available facts she began to giggle, remembered the food and ran toward him.

He reached out his arms to her and smiled and as a result, she ran faster. “Perhaps it works for humans as well.” He lifted her and threw her into the air as she reached for the sun, laughing.

 

**Thirteen Years Later**

 

Cara considered the word ‘ensconced’ as she looked at Senar. She was at home in his home, carrying out established rituals and habits she cherished. They had a standing engagement for dinner and Pon-Ifa three nights a week. She never missed it, looked forward to it, seemingly pulled toward him with magnetic force. She always breathed easier, walked faster when she was moving toward him, everything darker and tighter as she walked away. He was usually over at their house for the other nights or they were all out at a community gathering together. He was a phenomenal cook, like her father. Every exceptional meal in her life had been prepared by one or both of those men. Mom didn't cook, claiming her gifts lay in other pursuits. It was true, her father agreeing and saying that Saoirse Fanning was a destination. Cara was a student of her mother's unique martial art form through blessed genetic lottery. Other students visited from the colony, even from other worlds. As the only extrovert in the Fanning clan, which included Senar by Saoirse’s decree, her mother gathered supplemental friends and family like bouquets. They sometimes relocated to Mindoir temporarily or permanently. Her mother chose excellent people to instruct and retain as staff at her exclusive studio and therefore to include in their lives, turning away droves of applicants on the basis of their ‘energy.’ Cara and her father didn't have the gift of ‘energy’ assessment, trusting to her mother’s judgment, often delivered with a subtle ‘no’ shake to her head, inexplicable but reliable. There were very few approving nods.

Senar said he relied on background checks to determine character, but those assessments confirmed what Saoirse knew intuitively.

Cara had tried to get her mother to explain or teach her how to detect and gauge ‘energy’ as that was an obviously useful skill, but her mother had said “I can't, love. I don't know how I do it, I just do it. A person’s energy is a physical thing. Sensory systems are needed to detect physical things. Eyes see light. Ears hear vibration. I must have some sense other people don’t have. If the first step is ‘have that sense’ and I was born with it and never developed it myself, I can’t tell you how to develop it the same way I couldn’t teach your father how to carry a baby. Our bodies, our minds are all made differently and diversity is a beautiful thing when we learn to share it and not be afraid of what we don't understand in ourselves and others. There are things to be afraid of, which is why I don't welcome everyone into our lives, but being different isn't one of them. Not everything can be taught, not everyone has the same capacity. Can you teach me how to do instant long division?”

Disappointed but solemn, Cara had acknowledged that no, she couldn't. She had assumed everyone could do it because it was as easy as breathing, but other people couldn't feel the numbers go where they needed to be like drops in a waterfall falling in free space with gravity, always landing in the right place. She was glad she had something unteachable, sure she was special-smart in her own way and had something to contribute if her mother said so.

Her mother had smiled at her “I can't do what your father does with living things, aesthetics or food. I can't do what you do with numbers. We all have different gifts. I'm sorry I can't teach you, but I’ll always share it with you and appreciate what you can do.”

“Do I have good energy?”

“You have the best energy, love.”

Mindoir cuisine was such that they didn't have galactically diverse culinary products or a deep talent pool. Her father and Senar were it, pretty much. Mindoir had excellent apple pies in most kitchens, but if you were looking for a galifen and rosemary tart with browned butter kigi-nut crust, and why would you because it hadn't existed before her father and Senar invented it, you were out of luck until the next community picnic. Or unless you were Cara. In Sanctuary there was abundant produce, staple imported supplies and a utilitarian diner for those who couldn't manage cooking on their own, but most managed on their own. Mindoir was prosperous but didn't have the population or inclination to support fine dining as a daily option. Nobody was going to zip out here for lunch from the Citadel. The Fanning menu selection was exceptional according to everyone who had sampled it. Senar had won her father's heart by providing generous access to Drell ingredients, recipes and techniques. Mom and dad were omnivores, but Cara had gravitated toward human vegetarian and particularly Drell vegan options. Senar brought over imported ingredients as often as her father brought in home-grown product from the fields. Their refrigerator and pantry were always stocked with Drell, human and fusion favorites. Much of her contemplation and appreciation of food had been influenced by her father's love for Mindoir's produce and Senar's procurement of galactic delicacies that did not carry another creature’s suffering as part of the otherwise exorbitant import price.

Her father was paid generously to develop that produce so its abundance was guaranteed. Senar’s insistence that luxury food items were best shared with his family had been a happy fact of her life. Any bowl, plate or platter provided by Senar or her father at any community event was prized and ransacked first.

Having sampled other people's food at those events, she knew why.

Now she tried to go to those gatherings full before she got there, to give her neighbors maximal chances to get what she had every meal.

And to not have to eat what other people made.

Senar sparred with her mother, was fascinated by her father's innovations in botany and contributed his own unique meals that always appealed to Cara’s curiosity, philosophy, and palate.

She was blessed.

So Senar was handsome, accomplished, serene, talented and…

And she beat him at Pon-Ifa and that made her feel good.

‘Ensconced’ seemed to suit how she felt in his home. The word itself sounded and felt Drell in its luxurious formality. She felt like a lit candle in a setting made for her, intended to produce the most light and also to be…

Pretty.

She felt pretty here.

She didn’t really feel pretty anywhere else or with anyone else.

His home even had shades of color and lighting that complemented her hair and skin. It had always been this way, a happy accident that he decorated in tones of green, gold and coral that subtly made her feel secretly, poetically welcomed, his colors and hers exquisitely living in harmony. Other colonists had homes and minds that made her feel sallow, pale or excluded, but here she felt… ensconced.

She wasn’t Drell and she knew she wasn’t glowstone in a ritually swirled cloth cradle. She wasn't serene, inert or uniform. She was a human candle, complete with fire hazard and potential for spilled molten wax. She did not have his grace. She did have a heated mind and didn’t take well to being jostled.

She teased him with repetitive human humor as he reset the board. “Are you absolutely sure you're not letting me win?”

He smiled at her tone and teased her back in Drell straight-man formality as though to offset her human foibles. “Seleia, I am not. You have earned each victory. I enjoy each game.”

Her voice changed to truly grateful. “So do I. Thank you for playing.” She considered again letting him win next time and then dismissed it. Traditions should be upheld. He was good at everything else, this was hers. It’s not as though he ever let her win at sparring.

“You are welcome.” He meticulously set the pieces for the next game. He insisted on doing that at the end of each match. In that way, the board was always ready. There had been a time where she had apprehensively said he probably didn't want to play anymore after she had racked up enough wins. She had been nervous about his lessons ending because she knew everything about the game he could teach her. She didn't want to stop visiting him to play, but maybe he was too polite to withdraw his invitation? Was she imposing? That had been a terrible thought she hadn't wanted to be true. He had said she would know that to be true if he ever permitted his most recent defeat to be his last and left the board frozen in concession. Technically the board was hers, a gift from him when she won her first match at nine years old, but she had said she wanted him to guard it for her and to keep playing, that maybe it could be theirs that way. He had been pleased by that request, giving her one of his smiles that assured her they understood one another. He had promised her that if he was resetting the board he was anticipating the pleasure of playing again.

She expected his ritual offer to refresh her mug of hot chocolate. Instead, he stood, walked over to her side of the table and knelt on one knee beside her. She was startled at his serene change in altitude.

What was going on?

Her brows drew together and he smiled at her. He was relaxed, limbs graceful as the leather pulled across his thighs and shoulders in that pose.

Don’t. Notice. That.

She swallowed, fervent blush swarming across her face.

His smile deepened.

Don’t. Notice. That. Either.

“Seleia, although I wish to linger in this moment, I fear you are uncomfortable.”

“Good guess.”

“With the passage of your birthday recently you have reached the traditional human threshold of adulthood. I am now free to ask you to consider a romantic relationship with me.”

She blinked.

She froze.

She was dreaming. Had to be.

His head dipped as he smiled with familiar teasing. “You are not asleep, Seleia.”

He knew her so well, could practically read her thoughts. Throughout her life that had been weird, comforting and eventually understood in its potential for family and friend. Now it was suddenly terrifying and newly fascinating with the potential for ‘romantic relationship.’ She blinked again and then swallowed, murmuring “You could say that in a dream.”

He gazed at her, warmth flooding his expression. “In several ways, I am. This is a treasured dream of mine, Seleia, but I do not wish for it to end in a trip to the medical facility. Remain seated and breathe.”

She gulped air. Her mind raced, ineffectively trying to braid what he had just said into her life up to this point. She couldn't. She couldn't even absorb the concept of him being on his knees in any context. Panic induced her to say “WHY?”

His eyes closed Drell-double and reopened, his voice uncharacteristically serious, some undefined social distance cleared deliberately. How long had he been a blink away from that expression? “So many reasons, Seleia. Can you think of none?”

He normally had an indulgent expression mixed with some encapsulated ‘I know something you don't know’ and this moment was tipping her into considering everything she didn't know about love or… sex… especially what she didn't know about him and how much imagining him in that context terrified her. She blurted “What can I do for you?”

“My Seleia… at the moment all you need do for me is smile and say yes. This is less about doing and more about being.”

“Involvement means more than… smiling. Why me?”

“Why not you?”

“Well… I’m human, I’m young, I’ve done… just about nothing to earn...” She trailed off forlornly, maddeningly unable to even define terms, falling into a deep pit of inarticulate, ignorant unknown.

“I am not speciesist. I am not ageist. You have inspired me to fall in love with you, negating your final concern.”

“WHY?”

“Seleia, love is not something I can explain in words. You have beautiful eyes. You have an extraordinary heart. You possess a formidable intellect. Those are reasons for attraction or approval, but not love. I know you wish answers to all questions but love is a truth beyond my capacity to comprehend or describe. It is composed of past and potential experiences. It is something requiring faith and hope that any future we envision is best created together. Do you love me?”

“Of course I do!”

“Why is your answer ‘of course’ but mine must be questioned?”

“You’ve always been here, you’ve always taken care of me, you’re like… you’re like Mindoir. Everything meaningful has only gone… one way. From you to me. What can I offer in return? What if I lose you? What if you’re wrong? What if… what if all those reasons that you don’t know why you love me are here today but… aren’t there some other day and you won’t be able to say why then either? What if they aren’t there now? If this is about my eyes, what if I lose my eyes or my mind? What if I’m mean to you… or stupid? Would you still love me? Would you HAVE to love me? Would you be stuck with me?”

He wondered again if he glowed for her. He believed he did based on the way her eyes reacted to seeing him, but was not as certain of her as he had been with his Drala'tem and wished to hear it from her lips. It was difficult to parse what she saw in him because she loved him platonically concurrent with being attracted to him erotically. She was accustomed to not acknowledging synesthesia. She was not adept at hiding her free-flowing and potentially volatile emotions and reactions in his presence. Her eyes, expressions, pulse rate, and hormone levels had always responded differently to him than to others, but he was also a bright iridescent green, unlike everyone else she had ever met on Mindoir in physical presentation and emotional significance. Her reactions to him had always defined him as special and precious to her. A glow she had seen in him likely since her early childhood would not attract her attention as much as the storm surges of raw emotion and inspiration that were her experience of self. His Seleia’s synesthesia had evolved likely as it had with Drala'tem - in her sacred, secret places about which she did not speak, subjective and fragile. She trusted synesthesia as a Signpost, but not as a conclusion in itself. She was always wary of reliance upon it solely and feared being questioned about magical hunches. Although she trusted him and her parents explicitly, she knew she was different and that was an experiential truth held in her bones. Drala’tem had protected her synesthesia defensively and with worry. Seleia guarded it like a shrine hidden in a sacred grove along a Path only she could find or walk.

He had chosen to believe it did not matter if he glowed because his Path was set and his choices would not alter in order to invoke the ‘need’ or ‘mystery’ in her necessary to create synesthesia aura in her. His service was absolute and he knew that to be his own Path and shrine. The malleability of time could answer his question if he chose that course. With venom, he could have her answer. He knew how prone she was to venom and the echoes of influence that would ripple through her mind unpredictably. He would not risk subjecting her to that, but with time manipulation he could ask her and then relive those hours, loop out her experience of venom but keep the information. He chose to earn the right to that information by waiting for her to decide that truth belonged to him. Her parents did not glow. She had never had to decide to need them because they had been there for her each day of her life. He had chosen to be that for her, to become family and be woven into her mind and perceptions from her first day of life. He stood and pulled her to her feet. As he stepped closer to her she tried to back up but was blocked by the chair behind her. He raised a brow ridge in mild challenge. “Seleia, you have an inquisitive mind. We can conduct an experiment and perhaps you can obtain some of the answers you seek.” She swallowed and held her ground as he stepped closer, gaining the treasured angle of looking down at her with her glorious and turbulent green eyes tipped up to his. He savored the feel of this particularly familiar smile on his lips and the taste of teasing. He said in intimate, chiding tones, invoking and celebrating her bellwether blush “My Seleia, are you concerned that I am too accomplished and too handsome for you? Are you that shallow?”

She closed her eyes tightly and her brows drew together in chagrined self-evaluation “Maybe.” She opened her eyes and said in sudden accusation, fresh-found proof of his lack of interest “You haven’t ever touched me. You’ve always worn gloves.”

“I have venom, Seleia. Particularly strong for Drell. Comparable in effect to your eyes.”

“Stop teasing.”

“Never. But in this case, I am not teasing. I am offering a path to illumination on a subject we both wish to explore.”

“Your venom is ‘strong’ how?”

“In addition to being handsome and accomplished, I am persuasive.”

More exasperated accusation in her eyes at his obvious understatement “Duh.”

“Pharmacologically persuasive, Seleia. My venom causes receptivity to suggestion.”

“Oh. That’s… terrifying.” She did not disclose that ‘fascinating’ was also a prime descriptor put forth by her at-the-moment unwelcome curiosity.

“Yes. It is. That is why I have not touched you. That is why I will not until you understand the potential of my skin and voice. You must consent to them, something you could not do as a child. I wish to inspire love and confidence in you, Seleia, not terror. We must inform your parents that you find me attractive and wish to allow me to explore being effectively persuasive.”

She closed her eyes, sucked in a breath and muttered: “That won’t be awkward.”

“You are a brave woman. Your parents are extraordinary people. It is the first step we must take together or you will feel as though you are doing something furtive, and that I will not allow. I will permit no shame to touch what we share. Venom also carries hallucination as an effect. You are likely to see light and auras when you look at me.”

That baited statement brought her confirmation of synesthesia sotto voce “I already do…”

He showed no sign of having heard but his heart surged with what he had told himself did not matter. He realized it did matter, very much, that he was exultant to have earned it, that he wanted every potential gift her eyes could grant. It mattered to her. She would reach for him, need him, trust him. The question of when he had begun to glow for her replaced the previous mystery and he smiled at her, prompting her to smile back in her reflexive need to agree, to comfort him, to protect him. Knowing their path was lit by that glow was a poetic grace note of profound beauty.

She claimed his hand with hers and pulled him outside, declaring “Fine. I’m not a coward.”

“I have faith, Seleia. You are wrong that you have offered me nothing in return. You have not valued those contributions. I have. I wish to have you with me each day. I do not wish a future without you.”

She stopped suddenly and turned to him, her conspiratorial smile radiant as she said: “Want to know a secret?”

“Yes.”

“I have faith too. Weird faith, but faith.”

“It is my experience that all faith is weird.”

She laughed and determinedly pulled him toward the Fanning farmhouse, the lane between their homes traveled often, their destination visible between shifting leaves and glinting with welcoming light. Mindoir had embraced and cared for him as he had cared for her. He had confidence in Saoirse and Ronan’s answer. They accepted their daughter’s relative social inattention and lack of insight, teased and instructed her gently when it could be productive but otherwise let her be who she was with their unquestioned love and support. They had allowed Senar in their familial circle and he had always done the same, protecting her from social censure by the wider community. His Seleia knew she was loved, but her experience of those outside her parents and him made her feel as though she were simultaneously too much and too little for them. She was right. She struggled with being ‘just right’ for others because it made her world colorless and slow. To meet her was to be exposed to the pyroclastic flow of the combination of disorienting information she was engaged in processing and her interest in identifying and dispelling any manufactured personality a person presented to her. She helpfully attempted to define and comprehend the truth she sensed beneath.

Hardly anybody found it helpful.

She found herself in the position of trying to convince people they were who they were and meeting resistance. She did not understand why anybody would not want to honor and uncover the truth. As a child, she had often accused adults of lying to her or asked other children why their parents were acting dumb or mean. Of course, they had been lying, dumb and mean from her perspective; she had been granted information, explanation, and inclusion each moment of her life by exceptional, loving parents and considered those things to be inalienable rights. It would be a lifetimes-long struggle for her in any iteration to comprehend and then accept that there were people who chose to embody neglect, ignorance, malice and cruelty. She had spent many years in near-religious fervor advocating for truth before she had realized being a beacon of revelation made her a target of malice. Ultimately, she had and would again choose to strategically oppose rather than openly convert those who took destructive paths that denied free will to the innocent.

She preferred his company in part because her mother and father both insisted upon spending the majority of their time pursuing their own interests, but Senar shared and indulged hers. She had progressed to knocking on his door at work, still bringing him flowers, learning the security systems on Mindoir thoroughly and indulging her gift for hacking. In theory. She did not invade privacy, but she did enjoy metaphorically picking locks he devised for her and developing new methods to provide better security. He presented her with challenges, instruction, and reward, always receptively welcoming of further inquiry.

Her parents recognized incontrovertible facts about their daughter and accepted them. She was not suited to casual social interactions, her high-impact thirst for information potentially resulting in virtual unanesthetized psychological vivisection in random acquaintance. Her parents did not insist that Cara ‘meet new people’ and statistically Cara had determined that meeting new people was not rewarding. Cara sought her own comfort zone in Senar's company and her parents were grateful for his presence.

When Cara was nine years old he had told her parents of a Drell tradition of spiritual mentorship of those with extraordinary gifts, that it was sacred and guided by Arashu's will. He had confided in them that he was regrettably being indiscreet by revealing Drell religious philosophy, but the gift of being chosen by Arashu to follow the Path of ham sta’ba as their daughter's guide was blessed and he honored Cara’s gifts as goddess given. He apologized if that was an imposition upon their beliefs or if he had overstepped bounds by embracing the role of her mentor, but he believed they must agree that their daughter was exceptional and deserving of education and access to extraordinary resources in order to fulfill her potential.

They had agreed.

It was a comforting lie, the name taken from his Drala'fa's exasperated description of his ideally wishing to protect her by placing her in a virtual hamster ball.

The description suited them both. She could exercise her racing curiosity each day and he would ensure she experienced no real injury.

He supposed he could have populated Mindoir with fascinating, honest and kind unique geniuses that appreciated her, but he had not. Mindoir's colony had been established without time manipulation from him because otherwise, Cara’s conception would not have taken place.

After her conception, he left the colonists in place because it suited him to be her best if not only option for companionship.

It was true that he revered the state of ham sta’ba. The fact that the word or tradition had never existed outside his own elaborately manipulative mind was not something the Fannings could confirm or deny, Drell being so secretive.

Cara's parents had, of course, watched him carefully as she grew older. He became her tutor and she monopolized him as she considered her right. There had been nothing untoward to watch, sexual interest in her shut off by choice and inclination as he embraced familial bonds and the pleasures and therapeutic value of proxy parenthood and caretaking with assured control over the setting, something impossible with Kolyat as Thane Krios had possessed neither care nor control as assets.

As Cara had aged, Saoirse had chosen her moves carefully with Ronan’s understanding and cooperation. In order to protect her daughter from a member of a notoriously easily offended and secretive race that may or may not have a history of sexual predation but certainly had a history of ritualized cultural acceptance of separation of body from spirit, she had offered herself as bait.

She had chosen to test whether he would be tempted to accept her as a willing alternative to her forbidden and clueless daughter. No doubt her extraordinary intuition had determined that he was not, could not be who he presented himself to be. Unable to determine who he was she chose to test what he would be willing to risk for personal gratification. She had deftly provided him with exquisitely subtle signs of interest. He knew them to be lies. She appreciated him but was as devoted to her husband as Senar was to his Seleia.

He admired her selfless, subtle gambit to protect her daughter, her moves as well considered and constructed as her martial art form. Her approach was deceptively straightforward, exhibiting perfect balance and the potential for a coiled-viper strike; the essence of the woman herself.

She had risked a friendship she valued, a friendship her husband valued, Senar's anger and the trauma of attempting to explain it to Cara. Had he proven even slightly willing to tear apart the Fanning family for sexual gratification he was certain he would have been banished from their lives. No doubt they had been prepared to leave Mindoir entirely to protect Cara if necessary.

It was worthy of recognition as elaborately manipulative to a level he appreciated and applauded. Saoirse was a goddess in her own right, but he would no more consider her a partner than he would consider Arashu a partner.

She was an objective.

Senar signaled to her that he understood her incremental advances and did not reciprocate, making clear he considered them to be charming and flattering flirt-teasing as was potential human custom. Saoirse had allowed that conclusion with satisfaction and Ronan had jovially contributed to the teasing regarding Drell irresistibility.

It had all been exhibition and Saoirse had rewarded his passage of that trial by asking him to be the only guest instructor at her studio, teaching his own style and choosing his own students, his Seleia being one of them.

Saoirse granted him the unspoken respect of recognizing that he had seen it as a test and she treated it as an inside joke, subtle manufactured interest gone, replaced by overblown, inappropriate flirting that induced snorting laughter in her husband and embarrassed fluster in her daughter.

As time passed and his Seleia’s interest in him evolved from treating him as her personal Drell pet to treating him as her personal emotional and sexual problem to solve, her parents shared rolled eyes and grins between them. They included Senar in empathic solidarity when Cara failed to notice or conceal her own obvious signs of attraction. Her preference for and proximity to him resulted in communal selective blindness as Saoirse’s adopted family at the studio very carefully did not notice as his Seleia openly stared at him or inexpertly attempted to hide her fascinated and compulsive glances. Her expression bore a combination of wistful hunger and determination that she would figure it out as long as figuring it out did not involve admitting to wistful hunger. Although he had never claimed a right to her, he had deftly let her parents know by his reserve and simultaneous courtly indulgence of her ignorance and growing attraction that he would manage any choice she made with grace and protect her from less generous colonists who were not as benevolently blind or prone to be kind. He made certain her parents were assured that he would potentially content himself with picnics and Pon-Ifa for a lifetime as he had since her birth unless she chose to admit to her wistful hunger.

Her parents were assured he had other options if he wished to take them. They also knew they would be informed immediately if he waned or intensified in his interest in their daughter or anyone else. Her lack of discretion and the colonists’ fascination with gossip would assure that outcome within hours if not minutes of any perceived change in his habits. Being an extraordinarily eligible and unavailable Drell bachelor had made Saoirse ask him once if he felt he was the only civilized being in a voluntary cage designed to keep out the human zoo exhibits that liked to stare. They had been sparring at the time and he had replied that at least three humans were excellent company and he was grateful for her welcome into their otherwise private heaven.

He believed Saoirse had adopted him officially on that day. He had provided them with babysitting and stability for their beloved, potentially misunderstood treasure of a daughter and they had given him everything they had in humor, friendship and love.

He admired Ronan and Saoirse for the synergy they embodied, the child they had brought into being and the life they had wrought from will and inspiration.

They were his family and no harm would come to them.

No harm that they would remember. He had and would reset and rearrange time to ensure that.

He enjoyed the walk, the evening and the moonlight in her hair. Her brisk pace did not falter and she was too nervous to speak, her courage forward-facing and her hand holding his gratifying in its tight grip. What had begun with his faith would be sustained by her faith. Their faith. He imagined and then filtered his senses to see the arcing, streaming magnetism of Mindoir holding them on their Path and it seemed Fate carried the same embracing and invisible forces. Fate, his will and her eyes.

She pulled him into the Fannings’ candle-warm kitchen, her parents talking at the table.

She did not let go of his hand.

His Seleia opened her mouth, closed it, took a deep breath and said in a nervous rush “For some reason he says he loves me and I’m trying to figure out why. I’m not saying it makes sense, but I want it to. I want it to make sense a lot. He won’t touch me until I tell you that so far he hasn’t touched me but… um. He has venom?”

Her parents looked unsurprised, conspiratorial smiles curving their lips in slow unison with a shared glance between them. At the mention of his venom, Saoirse’s brows rose. She turned to Cara and said gently “All Drell do, love.”

“He says his is special.”

Ronan said “Lucky you” with a grin. He shared a look of prophetic appreciation with his wife as though they were collecting on a bet they had made together and then looked to his daughter “Take him off the market officially, Lal, or several jealous men and women in the vicinity are going to kill you. You're only alive so far because he wouldn't like it and he’d kill them back.”

Saoirse turned her attention to Senar with a teasing once-over glance “I’d have tried to go after him myself, but I find myself occupied.”

Ronan nodded as though in mock relief to finally admit it “Oh, me too. That.”

Saoirse smirked in appreciation and then turned her attention to her bemused daughter fully “Cara, don’t tell anyone about his venom. He is telling us in confidence.”

“I know that, mom!” Cara stared, open-mouthed and expectant of undisclosed objection from them.

Ronan said gently “Lal, that man loves you. He has since the day you were born. He’s family. We’re keeping him even if you don’t find him to your liking. I’d give him some sort of lecture about taking care of my little girl, but historically I’ve had to up my parenting game to stay relevant. I’m grateful he hasn’t given me some sort of lecture about taking care of his little girl, who isn’t little anymore. You're an adult now. The rest is up to you, not us.”

“Oh.” Cara looked at the encouraging and vaguely amused faces of her parents, deflated of her bravado, finally asking plaintively “But… what if it doesn’t work?”

Saoirse casually brought a celimer berry to her mouth and chewed, saying dismissively “Get back to us on that if it comes up. In the meantime, the man has special venom. You have our blessing and permission. With anyone else, we would be in vague shock that you bothered asking or think we’d be the slightest bit surprised. You being you, though, it’s understandable. Him being him, it's appreciated. We’re glad to hear it from you both rather than from some anonymously flash-broadcasted drone footage, you both being utterly fascinating to farmers with too much free time and no sense of boundaries. Whatever you both need from us, you have it if it’s standing in the way of you dragging him back outside and kissing him in 3...2…”

Ronan chided “Mavourneen, don't say ‘farmer’ like it’s a bad thing.”

Saoirse clarified with mock exasperation and widely dismissive waving of her graceful hands “You're not a farmer, you're The God of the Harvest! Totally different thing!”

“Of course I appreciate your regard, but in defense of farmers…”

A surge of sizzling excitement ran through Cara as she pulled Senar out of the candlelight and into the moonlight. Once they were outside he lifted her in his arms and carried her to the Meeting Stone.

She spent the travel time in shock and he did not speak.

She was giddy. This was all surreal and NOW. She was the luckiest woman in existence. She didn’t lunge for him because… because she didn't know HOW… and he still had his gloves on. He was the accomplished one. He sat down in the warm breeze and moonlight with his back to the stone, arranging her on his lap facing him as she caught up to the idea of ‘touching.’ He made her lightheaded. She blurted “Can I tell you that you’re handsome?”

“Yes.”

“Can I tell you I’m excited?”

“Yes.”

“Can I tell you I’m terrified?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.” That seemed to cover it. He took off his gloves as she watched, fascinated. He had his deliberate Pon-Ifa face on as though he were setting the board. Nervousness spurred her to ask “Why don’t you seem excited?”

“Seleia, if I were to appear as excited as I feel, you would be more terrified.”

“Oh.” Well. That was a lot to think about. There was so much that could go wrong, but So Much That Could Go Right and she was going to pour all her effort into that. She was going to find and solve every potential problem and be the BEST for him. But… what was the best?

He set his gloves aside as she rushed to say “What if I’m not – ” Partway through that statement his eyes turned to her as he blinked double lids slowly. Detached deliberation was gone from his expression. She was suddenly dry-mouthed as she saw hints of how she could be more terrified by seeing him… excited. He wasn't angry at her, but there was an intensity of emotion that jammed her brain trying to understand the compelling new look on his face. Was he warning her away from saying or thinking such things? It… he… was thrilling and comforting in his guardian way. His glance was like a growl facing the threat. She didn't know ‘people’ in general well, but she knew him. Or she had. He had always been patient, understanding and blessedly willing to explain anything and everything about himself, about her, about the world that she didn't understand. Unlike the rest of reality, he was willing to share his understanding and nature. He was the only non-parent person in her life that came with a User’s Manual. He let her flip to any page and flood him with requests if not demands for explanations. He was and had always been vigilant, protective and loyal. He had repeated often that her curiosity was an excellent attribute, but she was prone to wanting to verify the nature of all things directly without precaution. He had pointed out that her instinctive approach was problematic with things like eezo, topical poisons and exposed drive cores. Maybe he was trying to do this in a way that satisfied her known voracious curiosity safely, taking care to not expose her to the drive core of her own self-doubt and ignorance or any danger inherent to the subject at hand.

But he’d also said he couldn't explain or describe love!

How could he feel something this important and not be able to define it?

Then she remembered her synesthesia.

Right. Maybe some things were so private and specific that words couldn't be found. Or not believed. Or someone might decide the speaker was crazy.

Platonic and familial love in general she understood, but this was all new.

He had never been imperious or bossy. He had always defined boundaries with authority, wisdom, and grace. He had always told her it was his privilege to care for her, so this was familiar. It was clear he would take care of her and her curiosity. He would show her, not tell her.

Maybe he was crazy. Maybe she had no right to judge because she was crazy too, silently so. Maybe she was a coward.

The man she had known, relied upon and needed every day was transforming into someone she didn't know, someone who had considered ‘romantic relationship’ as she’d had no clue. She was physically, emotionally and spiritually lost and even feeling betrayed by not knowing his intent, all that tied up in knots of being afraid she would screw it up somehow.

She could lose him in her life, the solid and stable Senar she knew changing suddenly into someone unknown and unpredictable. What if her ‘unpredictable’ as a result made him change his mind, close off, turn him into someone who was disappointed in and avoided her company?

What if she made him not want to play? What if he left the board frozen in her defeat?

That was an awful, gut-cold thought and she couldn't bear that idea, the impulse to cry triggered by imagining cold disapproval on his face directed at her.

She recalled her enthusiasm with each new subject revealed in his presence. Learning of medicine, she had wanted to be a doctor, NOW. Learning of physics, she had wanted to be a scientist, NOW. She inherently demanded to know everything about a subject as soon as it was revealed. He had always indulged her but reminded her that information, experience, and wisdom were factors that took time.

So, she was demanding to know everything about their future NOW and wanting to be a… a what? A wife and a mate and an experienced, wise adult… NOW.

Childishly.

She thought she was DEFINITELY going to screw this up. Hadn't she already?

His hands moved her as his eyes held hers in suspense. She cooperated with his gentle insistence as he settled her in his lap in the same way he would meticulously place the Doyenne centered in her square. In one way it was terrifying, but it was also a shared moment with him where he taught her something she wanted to know.

She was even used to being physically guided by him, used to touching without venom. Blush sped over her as she realized all the times they’d sparred, all the times she’d been overwhelmingly flustered and insufficiently focused, all the times he had directed her with guiding hands through combat form.

The times he had taken her down to the mat, as maybe he’d been considering how it would feel to take his gloves off, skin to skin like this.

As all he’d offered was a smile, his hand to help her back up and his ritual response to imperfect but dedicated practice; “Good, Seleia. Again.”

She fervently hoped she’d get the same opportunity here, that he’d feel the same way if she was imperfect but dedicated.

Good.

Seleia.

Again.

She should pay attention. What if this was the last time she saw him? She tried not to cry, tried to calm down, tried to trust him. This might follow the pattern that had held true throughout her life. He’d taught her how to swim. He’d taught her how to drive. Those had also been scary, but he’d been there for them and more, encouraging her when she doubted and restraining her when she was heedless or impulsive. His voice came to her now, warm with new depths as he asked her “What if you are?” He sounded sure. Socratic. He knew. Even her parents knew. Apparently, a lot of jealous people in Sanctuary knew. Why didn’t she? Did she? Maybe she did but she didn't believe her luck. She had no doubt he loved her and was her family… but romantically? That was new. To her.

She knew she wasn’t good with change. This was a huge change.

She wanted to believe and she tried to comprehend permission and encouragement. Her father had said it was up to her now, but up to her HOW? She was supposed to be an adult, but nothing had ’transformed’ in her when she had turned 18. Only Senar's expectations of her had changed. What if she couldn't be an adult? Her blood seemed to gather in her suspended heart, abandoning her limbs and her brain. He guided her cold and numb hands around his neck, her warm and tingling thighs around his waist. His hands moved to her face, his thumbs along her cheekbones as he looked down at her. She saw moonlight and gold aura on his green and black markings as he asked her “What if you are my Seleia?” Her skin began to tingle where he touched her. His venom created shimmer glints gracing his face as his voice and fingertip strokes continued. She swallowed as his lips moved along the trembling side of her throat. Her head fell back. He cradled her and she felt precious to him. He was precious to her, as though her heart beat with him, for him.

His mouth at her ear caused a deep answering thrum through her spine and a dizzy lurch in her stomach as he said “Here is where you find your answer. Our answer.” His thumbs remained on her cheekbones, his palms spread over the sides of her face with his pinkies along her jawline.

He had been right.

This was a dream.

He lifted her head to gaze at her. He breathed hard, audibly, once, his face making an expression that looked like how she felt, but there was more to it she did not understand. It was like the moment of seeing the final moves of Pon-Ifa. She knew that feeling and became invested in it. It wasn’t like he was opposing her or that he was capturing her pieces, but that he had won the game for them together, savoring the inevitable moves. What she was feeling was twinned and teamed with what was on his face, the transformed expression of a man she knew and loved, a man who was letting her see what she hadn’t been allowed to see before, just like she hadn’t been allowed to touch him before.

Maybe he hadn't been hiding something from her so much as he had held something precious in reserve, presenting it now as a gift, locked in a hope chest until she was old enough to open it.

She felt a surge of protectiveness for him. Confidence from him usually flowed one way, but… her mother had warned her to not tell anyone about his venom, to protect him and his secrets from Cara’s occasionally heedless treatment of all information as something to be analyzed and shared.

Thanks, mom. I’ll protect him. I promise.

His lips brushed hers and her eyes closed with dizziness. Trailing sparks followed her into the new dark where she wasn't alone. She gasped with a whimper at the end. She had imagined kisses as warm and smooth but this was more like a shocked underwater muffling of her mind with her attention focused on the now-center of her world, which seemed to be their touching lips in the dark-dream. Suddenly she was a **Her** and he was a **Him**. He made a sound that was rougher and more heated than his comfort hum; encouragement, persuasion and clear approval. The edges of his teeth were on her lips as he bent her back by leaning forward and supporting her shoulder blades with strong hands that made her muscles flex to fit and feel them on her bare skin. With her eyes closed, she could feel the answer he was leading her toward, how it was up to her. She could feel him trembling. It was deep in his body, held like suspenseful breath. His kiss made the air spark and storm around and in them. The gravity of who he was made space ripple and light bend around and through them. They were reflection, refraction, and action together. With venom, he could share his version of synesthesia with her and that was a miracle. His breath pulled in suddenly and she thought involuntarily, adding a thrill of cold movement to the warm friction of their kiss. This is what he wanted her to know. He knew his answer. He was waiting for hers.

She gave it, her arms tightening around him, her thighs squeezing, which brought her into contact with hard, straining warmth pressed against her. The shock of contact surged into blood flush and the pounding in her heart spread to her head simultaneously with stomach flutters and deepened dizziness.

They both breathlessly groaned and the sound they made together at that moment was epiphany incarnate.

He was showing her she did this for him, she did this to him, and that was love. The deep tremble and the surface strength was love. Not being able to explain why WAS love.

She did know a lot about love. She had her parents’ example. They were smart, beautiful and hopeful people, but love was always more. Love was about choices and how to live, how to aspire to make the next moment better than the one before. How they were always in the right place at the right time because they were there and then together, no matter what the place or time offered.

She was still terrified, but she moved her mouth over his, wanting more of this answer, feeling it with her eyes closed. Her body pressed tighter to his and in response, his breath pulled in hard and he groaned, the sound making her spine feel like the lit, molten, fragile wick of an ensconced human candle. Her heart thrilled in syncopated beats.

Maybe he wasn’t speaking because he knew his venom made her prone to suggestion. But this was beyond ‘suggestive.’ This was definitive. He was someone she needed, wanted, loved. Maybe he wanted her to be sure. So, she was. She told him. She didn’t ask. She needed to answer him with her own deep strength as her surface trembled, so she whispered: “Marry me.”

His arms closed around her, hard, squeezing the breath from her as it seemed her words had squeezed his breath from him. He breathed as though he had fallen at the finish line of a marathon; hard gasps, eyes closed tight, clutching her to him.

That was a yes.

She leaned into his embrace, his tense-spread hands on her back with her body willfully twisting, trying to feel all of him at once.

He then whispered the word, barely audible as sound, thundering in life-altering potential; ‘Yes.’

She relaxed into what he might call a Rightness. This was good. The protectiveness she felt for him reinforced itself. She had felt sorry for him over the years, that he had always returned at the end of the day to an empty home. She’d imagined maybe he’d taken lovers, but she hadn’t been able to think of any women or men that he was anything but cordial toward.

Or… any men or women that were good enough for him. Including her.

And yet… all his time had been taken up with… her.

Now he wasn’t alone and she felt the tightness of his arms and the harshness of his breath as affirmation.

They stayed that way for a long time. The stars and the moon moved, the breeze blew and she felt she had done the right thing, promised herself she would learn everything she needed to know to make him happy.


	2. Chapter 2

When he spoke, his arms were tense around her, his lips in her hair. “Stay with me, Seleia. Do not leave me.” Her hand found his and she squeezed. “For now, no more than holding and kissing, no more than what we have done already. Grant me this. I need you. Live under my roof. Make it our roof. I need you in my bed. Our bed. I cannot bear distance for another day.” He paused in his impassioned plea and seemingly noticed her heart slamming and harsh breath. She heard the gentle smile in his voice as he said: “I do not wish to intimidate you with that request.”

“Too late.”

“Allow me to set our pace. We have time. I ask that you smile at me each day, spend each day in my company and night in my arms. Allow me to anticipate your worries about inexperience. Imagine me asking you into a kitchen for the first time.” His lips were along her throat and his voice in her ear as she shivered. No kidding she was intimidated. “There are knives and fire. Allow me to introduce you to the possibilities. You are not expected to prepare a meal for me. I will not truss you and throw you in the oven.”

She laughed, part relief and part too many other things with curiosity and nervousness jumbled in. “Saving that for later?”

His lips followed the vibrations of her laughter along her throat, causing a hard swallow. “You are the woman I wish to hold in my arms, exactly as you are right now. I long to stroke my fingers along your skin, to tell you and show you that I love you. To feel you breathe in my arms as you sleep. To see your hair and eyes in light and dark. These are simple and profound things that your promise and permission will grant to me. When and if you are ready to move forward, we will do so together. We will wait to consummate our marriage until our union is witnessed. Whatever you wish in that ceremony will be yours.”

She had no idea what ceremony. Something simple and short. She was relieved about going slow, curious about possibilities and there were more shivers from his hands and voice. “I need to learn how to… boil water?”

“Remember that you are not the meal, Seleia, nor am I. I am concerned that your research into sex may have uncovered aspects of objectification that are offensive to me. I wish to ensure you do not begin our life together with thought models that foster anxiety. There is a particularly egregious human saying about monogamy being a commitment to eat the same meal forever until one grows averse of the lack of variety. Have you encountered it?”

She nodded. She recalled her clinical and anthropological forays into trying to understand sex. They had been, as he’d said, offensive. She fortunately couldn’t associate them with him any more than she could associate all the abusive, painful cultural associations with family to her parents. They were, he was, this was special. She had more faith in him than in the Extranet.

Plus, he wasn't human.

The differential between ‘fucking’ and ‘making love’ confused and potentially frightened her. Her idea of sex and romance was invested with the concept of love. Sex in general in clinical or popular portrayal seemed horrifyingly reductionist, like a functioning human body broken down to dead and polished brittle bone. It couldn't be that. She couldn't do that. The terminology of analysis of the skeleton of sexuality stuck in her throat and she hoped his answers and demonstrations would address some questions that felt like knives and fire. She was too embarrassed about some questions and too terrified about the answers to ask.

He tightened his arms in a reassuring hug “My experience and understanding lead me to a different conclusion. It is the structure of our life together, metaphorically a fully stocked kitchen and a varied menu that will feed us. You have your parents’ example, you know how this can be, should be. We will share intimacy, pleasure, love, humor, sex and purpose, prepared for each other with joy. You cannot become an expert at sex with a kiss, you cannot become an expert chef with one dish. It is a lifetime practice and one I look forward to sharing with you. We will not be the same people or want the same things from day to day. What we will do is learn what we want for ourselves and for each other, learn how to get that for ourselves and each other. Novelty in sex is fetishized often and will not apply to our relationship. If you are under the impression that I crave that, do not think so. If you are under the impression that you must provide that, do not think so. Tell me yes to living in my house. The moment you cross the threshold it will become our home.”

“Now?”

“Now and always. Part of you growing to understand me lies in comprehending the depth of my devotion, Seleia, to gain confidence that this is not a whim, not a question and that you have nothing to prove to me. Allow me to enjoy your presence in moonlight, sunlight, glowstone and candle. Allow our hands to touch. Appreciate simple things undertaken with reverence and joy. I wish to share with you the pleasures of living one by one. Do not fear that I crave complication. All I wish is you. We will find our way together, each step cherished.”

She was really glad he wasn’t human because that sounded wonderful and it sounded Drell and like something she didn’t have to worry about as much as she had. He was just as reasonable and loving as he had always been. He was committed to being an integrated, Whole person. He would not allow sex to be a thing only of the body. That had been a part of their lives together; him always drawing aspects of Spirit into what might otherwise be a purely physical experience. She was unbelievably lucky. She breathed a grateful “Yes.”

His voice was near hoarse as he said: “Thank you, Seleia.”

He kept his arms looped around her, bringing his Omni-Tool out to where she could see as he entered a notification to her parents. “She has granted me the honor of asking me to marry her. My answer is a grateful yes. I insist upon her staying with me from this day forward. I also insist upon monopolizing her, but our home is your home. Please join us for lunch tomorrow afternoon.”

She cosigned with her thumbprint and muttered “Oh, I see. I have to tell them in person but you get to leave a note.”

“I am otherwise occupied, Seleia. And impatient.”

He lifted her and carried her back to his home.

Pronouns.

Their… home.

Oh boy. That was going to take some getting used to.

She was giddy in the moonlight. When he opened the door, he took a smiling deep breath and carried her over the threshold.

So… it was done.

A surge of blush, fear and hope seared through her. His home was Mindoir-Drell chic. That’s what she’d dubbed it anyway. Specific crafts were available here made with native materials and he had decorated with gifts and goods that were local, but it had always had a Drell blend of austere barbaric splendor.

A lot like him.

His home was suitable for one person, which was odd as most homes on Mindoir were sprawling, intended to accommodate families as they grew. That luxury was one of the perks of having an entirely unsettled planet to work with. He wasn’t a farmer but a technical contractor in charge of communication and security. As the only Drell, in fact the only non-human in the settlement, he’d been a source of speculation and exclamation, but he’d created his own exceptions and no drama, helpful to everyone. She was familiar with the home’s entryway that opened into a social living space and a kitchen. That was pretty much it other than the bathroom down the hallway. At the end of the hallway was a door to a room she’d never seen and her blush whirred as he headed that way.

She hadn’t really thought about getting to see ‘the room’ and there was already too much giddy, but this got piled on.

It was lovely… in yellow-sand traditional Rakhana tones… and… a bed that was…

That was gone. He walked right through. Over another threshold.

And down…

Stairs.

Stairs?

Who knew the place had stairs?

Concealed stairs that he accessed through what otherwise looked like ‘wall’?

She was curious through the brief passage down a glowstone-lit staircase. She was shortly after completely shocked.

No more… Mindoir chic.

He had another house… under his house. Much bigger. Somehow looking as though it were naturally lit.

She hardly recognized anything in here and couldn’t place design origins. Yeah, Mindoir was a backwater and she wasn’t an architect or designer but…

Okay. So, one more shock today. She swallowed as he carried her into a rich and expansive room that would put most suites on the Citadel to shame. It wasn’t glittering or hard like the Citadel was. It was… a perfect setting for the man.

There was a huge kitchen she could see and other exits from the main space they’d entered, but he carried her into… she didn’t have words. A pillow bank? Traditional Rakhana tents had pillow-strewn interiors and fire and this was a modern interpretation, complete with fire pit. The space was filled with the scent of spice and desert. She’d never smelled desert, but she was SURE… that’s what it smelled like. There was an aisle down through a wide ring of gleaming, fabric-swathed pillows that had been artfully tossed into glorious disarray, sloping gently down like an amphitheater to the focal point of a circular fire pit. The flames carried Drell sigil shapes through it, a holographic projection through the fire? She thought they were sand script images, flickering and dancing within the natural-looking flames.

She had never seen anything like it.

He settled her gracefully in the pillow art installation facing the flames, her head higher up and her feet toward the fire. She stared at the spectacle and swallowed hard, wondering again… what he was doing on Mindoir and why he’d chosen her and how she was supposed to process… any of this. She felt like asking him in a vid-typical voice of incredulous curiosity “Who are you?” but ‘vid-typical’ wasn’t who she was, wasn’t who he was.

She had enough confidence in his capabilities that it was entirely possible he had designed every last one of these features and had built his ‘second home’ in his spare time the way Cavena Datu made replica Shaker furniture in her workshop as a hobby.

After arranging her he moved to where his body covered hers, his knees to either side of her hips and his thumbs moving along her cheekbones again, reverently. He gazed at her a long time and she was more captivated by his eyes than she had been by the fire. The pillows were scented with rich spice, the fabric sumptuous and their insides maybe containing some sort of gel that supported them in improbable ways. She wanted to run experiments on them and cut one open with a knife and… and but… oh, he was handsome.

And then he was kissing her again, venom renewing and her body remembering that arching into him was a new ambition she treasured.

He tasted sweet and rich, her skin was alive and humming, the scent of him blended with whatever came from the fire and the pillows in wafting exquisite overlay. He was glowing and glistening with synesthesia and venom auras. Her moans were answered by his steady pleasure hum and the encouraging, impassioned sounds that moved from his lips to her skin. Her senses were engaged and pitched to perfect harmony.

The mystery of the room was eclipsed by the power of the room and it seemed to perfectly suit him, therefore it was, of course, the right thing. He was obviously a very rich man and did not wish to flaunt his wealth but did wish to indulge in the blessings of technology blended with the more hedonistic aspects of Drell culture…

She could not blame him.

She wanted to clap but her hands were busy.

She reveled in the tastes, sounds, scents, touches and sights he made possible, all poetically pleasing and as such needing no explanation, only appreciative exploration.

When he pulled back, she resisted losing his lips on hers, craning her neck toward him and whimpering at the tragic loss of the best thing ever.

“I am not leaving you, Seleia. I never will. I wish to show you something.” He rolled to his back beside her. With a touch to his Omni-Tool controls they were suddenly within a holographic dome, a magnificent sandstorm rolling in from the horizon, orange-peach-yellow banded and swirling sand surrounding them. He said, “This is what Rakhana looked like before her fall.” There was directional warmth from the sun near the opposite horizon painted with exotic sunset colors and the sensation of wind, though not at storm capacity.

She was enthralled, her hand seeking his out and twining fingers, feeling a smile spread on her face, seeing his smile invested with the pride of pleased provider. He watched her, she watched the storm, turning to look at him with appreciative wonder.

She loved it here. She loved him.

He cycled through artful renderings of atmospheres, only a few of which she could identify, but he explained them all. There was the indigo of an Arctic winter’s night on Earth, violet and lavender plumes of the aurora borealis painting the sky. There was the plasma-blue spectacle of the pole of Jupiter above them with banding storms of the atmosphere swirling around the horizon. There were more, in turns turbulent or serene, each magnificent. Having never traveled, she felt the tug of wanting to explore the galaxy pull at her heart, but then it relaxed and settled into the realization that right here, right now, was more than enough. He set the sky to what was directly above them. Stars she knew. He squeezed her hand.

She tilted her head to look at him and for once didn’t really have any questions. She felt more like praying. She did not believe in a God, but she did believe in Senar and had for a long time. Silvie had often compared the qualities of childish and mature prayer. According to her, children often asked, demanded or begged for something, but an aspirant to true spirituality would make it their practice to speak prayers of thanks.

She looked at him and felt she could be forgiven for feeling as though she had been chosen by a Drell demigod who shared the gifts of the galaxy with her. She brought their joined fingers to her lips, kissed at the wide knuckle of his fused finger and whispered: “Thank you.”

He looked pleased, his austerity and authority gone in this place of fantasy. “You are welcome, Seleia. May our home grant you joy.”

Her sense of solidifying ‘home’ became more real from the way he said ‘our.’ His arms gathered her in and she rested her head on his shoulders. She told him “Mom always says that the Mindoir night felt eerie when she first got here because there were no crickets.”

“Would you like to hear crickets?”

“Then that would be eerie. I heard crickets in a recording I looked up after she said it. Creepy.”

“May I share one of my favorite views?”

“Please.”

The scene shifted and they were looking out over a wide sea from an ornate balcony accompanied by the sounds of gentle surf and soft bird cries. There was a glorious cobalt moon set like a faceted gem in a purple sky with blue-toned clouds in front and bright stars behind.

“Where is this?”

“The Shores. If there is a heaven for me, Seleia, it would be this place.”

“And if there’s a heaven for me, it would be this place.”

He moved to kiss her hair as she watched the stars move, listened to the surf and contemplated heavens nesting in each other like Matryoshka dolls, the kind also made on Mindoir in someone else’s spare time. She was at the center with him in mysterious perfection.

She fell asleep with his heartbeat under her fingertips and the surf lulling her into trance and then down into sea-deep contentment.

+++++++++++++++++++

When she woke he was there, gathering her into an embrace, his lips in her hair. “Good morning, Seleia. Thank you for the gift of your presence.”

She blushed and shifted, expecting to be cramped, but she wasn’t. She was perfect. He was perfect. They were perfect.

“You’re welcome. Thank you for being… obnoxiously attractive.”

He laughed and settled her more securely with his arm around her shoulders, her laughter into his chest. “You were fourteen when you judged me sufficiently attractive for me to see it in your eyes.”

“I… don’t remember.” His body against hers was what was right. “I love your stories.”

“This one is particularly prized. It was a rainy day and we were at the Caligen’s farm. One of their tractors had been mired in the mud. We helped dig it out.”

She breathed in slowly and memory prickled with details, filling in significance through the sleepy languor. “You… took off your jacket and shirt.”

“Mmmm. I did.”

His mouth moved along the back of her neck and her eyes closed. Oh, that felt… he felt so good. The warm flush of blood through her skin was accompanied by the swathing fall of invoked memory. She’d be more embarrassed but there wasn’t much room for that response, most of her attention was taken up with the memory and the things his mouth and voice were doing. “You had a shovel and your skin was wet. There was a break in the clouds right in front of the sun, but it was still raining and your shoulders were… you were so beautiful, surrounded by sun-sparked droplets. The way your skin glistened and your muscles moved seemed…” She searched for a suitable description and couldn’t find it, settling for saying “Really important.”

“Mmmm. And when I saw you watching me and my gaze sought yours you looked away.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Never be sorry for that. I knew on that day. Your eyes had always been open, welcome smiles. That did not change, but from that moment there was an added element of potential appreciation and measuring. I knew that you did not see me as yours in any way, but that day my shoulders set a standard.”

She groaned out of embarrassment and then was consoled by the fact that she was in ‘their’ home and he was telling her the tale of the Glorious Drell Shoulders from his perspective. “Like I said. Really important.”

“Those glances, that looking away, your silence and new standards, that is how your parents know, how I knew. How those in Sanctuary knew. You did not believe you were the potential or literal owner of my shoulders yet, but you certainly admired them and wished for a future mate who could offer you something comparable.”

“I did despair about the low odds of finding someone who was the owner of a suite of… really important… characteristics like your voice, mind, heart, spirit and… um… shoulders.”

“And any young man or woman who attempted to approach you saw that.”

“Did you threaten them?” It was half a joke and half the knowledge that he had known she was attracted to him potentially for years, wondering about his agency in her speculation.

“No need for overt confrontation. Anyone that was age appropriate was intimidated by your intellect and disinterest. You stayed contentedly near me as you defined new priorities, making it clear to all who you preferred as a companion. For anyone age-inappropriate, a meaningful glance from me deterred them.”

She was not naive enough to have missed the more overt ways some colonists had used to try to get her attention or the attention of other young women or men. Unlike other young women, she’d gone out of her way to avoid catching or keeping anybody else’s attention. She’d been too busy magnetically seeking Senar’s presence. Sanctuary was closely knit, highly social and interactive with shared holidays, harvests, picnics and dances. Those and other events provided ample opportunities for courting. She recalled always retreating to the safety and set standards of her Senar. After that day in the rain, even though she despaired of finding someone measuring up to him, she had definitely taken advantage of him being family. She acknowledged with some exasperation “I see that... NOW.” She never would have remembered that day as anything other than her isolated intellectual discovery or made the connection of change in pattern and missing information being observable by the community unless he had told her. Glances and looking away and her measuring meant a lot more than she had known at the time. Her mother had often tried to get her to ‘listen to what people don't say’ and that advice never made sense. Her parents or Senar always explained it to her after the fact. Even now she wondered how she was supposed to hear ‘silence’ or why people didn’t say it so she understood.

Even though she knew there were lots of things she did not say.

She was grateful to him for seeing, for listening, for smiling at her that day and not smirking, for not embarrassing her. For waiting four years until he could explain. She needed his safety and standards or she’d stumble through it all heedless and confused.

She was deaf to a lot of life's silences.

That was poetic and ironic.

“Had you been attracted to anyone else, I told myself I would have allowed you that path, but after the change in your eyes, Seleia, I began to think of you as potentially mine. It became possible to grow to want you as you grew to want me. I strove to set your standards and to be ‘really important’ for you.”

“It worked. Your shoulders were… are… things to aspire to.”

“As I aspired to your extraordinary eyes, mind and heart, Seleia.”

He lifted her and carried her to yet another magnificent suite in tones of green and gold. If there was ever a bedroom to be described as ‘master’ this would be it. He set her on her feet in front of what revealed itself to be a closet. It was bigger than her bedroom - her old bedroom. It was filled with clothing already, reminding her he had been planning in anticipation of her standing in front of it. It had the air of ‘costume department’ with a ‘beat-up denim overalls section’ ranging through to more and more formal and glorious. With her hand stroking along what looked like an animated, holographic fire-flame gown belonging in some extravagant musical she was going to ask him some questions but they answered themselves. If she asked him “What if I’d said no?” She imagined his smile and his question of “And what are the odds of that, Seleia?”

She blushed.

She would have made a joke about him being stuck with inventory and having to tailor it to another woman, but that wasn’t funny. She was distinct in size and coloring and with any other woman… he’d have to start over.

She suddenly really didn’t like the idea of ‘any other woman’ at all.

Fortunately, it didn’t seem likely.

“Wear what you wish, Seleia, if you desire other clothing, it will be yours. I have designed and chosen these, I will continue to supplement your wardrobe, do with it as you will.”

Once again, the only truly appropriate thing to say was a shocked “Thank you.”

“It is my pleasure.”

He drew her by the hand to an unbelievably - she’d have to redefine that word - glorious bathroom with a deep-sunk tub in gleaming sapphire.

His hands were steadying on her shoulders. “I know this is overwhelming. I would apologize but that would be disingenuous. It is a treasured ambition to overwhelm you. Your parents will be here for lunch shortly. After their visit, there is more I wish to show you.” He drew her in for another kiss, venom and promise. With her in vague, pacified and happy shock he held her chin in his fingertips “Seleia, you will someday know what this day means to me. Each day you will know more. Before you fully comprehend the why, honor this ‘when.’ Please hear it from my lips in this moment. I love you. I need you. I promise to watch over you each day and I will treasure each moment you share with me. Thank you.”

After a gentle brush of his lips, he turned and left. She swayed on her feet.

Okay, then.

Yikes and Yay.


	3. Chapter 3

She had chosen appropriately beaten-up clothing. It looked like denim but didn't feel like it. It was so very comfortable, fit her in ways nothing she’d worn before had achieved and felt exquisite, her fingertips and skin expecting to feel something rougher and more threadbare but encountering impossible luxury with her skin independently falling in love. If ‘ballet’ were ever woven into cloth, embodying impossible grace, this was it. 

She was now completely spoiled.

She was now really okay with that. 

Mostly.

She kept expecting to wake up.

Lunch with parents went well and they were smugly happy about the match. They stayed until dinner and through. She spent her day with the people she loved most and if every day could be like this, she would remain the happiest woman on Mindoir.

By the end of the day, she was tired and craving being near him. He obliged, stroking back her hair and carrying her to the bedroom downstairs, releasing her into rest with his hum and hands.

In the morning, embarrassed about her stunned hesitation and inexperience, she asked him “Do you want me to be… umm....”

His mouth was along the side of her throat, with his echoing “Mmmmm?” a distraction.

She laughed from a combination of his breath tickling her, his voice making her spine shiver and nervousness. It was easier to say this without looking at him. “Umm… moooore… demonstrative? I…”

His arms tightened and then relaxed, his mouth along her throat still. “Seleia, you are anxious. Will you permit me to utilize venom to have this conversation?”

“Why?”

“You will feel more willing to tell truths that anxiety might keep you from identifying or expressing. It will not lead to sex. It will lead toward defining your boundaries as they truly are, and we will respect those boundaries.”

She bit her lip. It all seemed terrifying, but being terrified with his help seemed the best way to go. “Okay. What do I need to do?”

“Smile for me, my Seleia, kiss me and then speak to me. I will do the rest. Have faith in me.”

She thought of saying ‘You say it like it’s going to be easy to do…’ but didn’t. Faith wasn’t something she was good at, but maybe he could help her. He had asked her to smile and kiss him, so she did those things, nervous and jumpy and impulsively driven, audacious energy investing the act of reaching for his frill. Her lips found his as she squeezed her eyes tight and took what Silvie called a ‘leap of faith.’ It seemed more like a leap of fear.

Kissing she liked. Kissing she was getting used to. She loved his rough kiss hum combined with the way the edges of his teeth made her feel. His kiss was passionate and special and so was she as a result. Venom brought sparks and shimmer behind her closed lids, her thoughts wavering and seeking his validation. She leaned in, physically, strategically and emotionally with faith in his guidance.

She was reminded of something he had repeated often to her when she expressed frustration with the irrational and erratic things she encountered in life. Things she then avoided. Things that were usually people. According to him, she was exceptionally intelligent and perceptive and she tried to predict people the way she could intuitively calculate numbers. Living creatures were comparatively irrational due to their complexity. Her frustration with her inability to accurately predict their systems, action and logic - herself included - was understandable but counterproductive. This was a consequence of the ease of her genius in one aspect of life; she expected to be a genius in all aspects. Failure to accurately predict all things distressed her. According to him, she needed to stop blaming her intellect for being inadequate or living creatures for being unpredictable. She needed to grant complexity without frustration to living creatures, including herself. 

To love. 

His lips lingered, sculpting the shape of what was becoming familiar; spontaneous belief in all things being right when she was in his arms. His lips did not leave hers soon and she forgot about having a conversation at all until he spoke. “Remember how you felt when I brought Boudica to you as a kitten.”

She smiled and gushed at the vivid reminder of fuzzy sunlit joy “She was so cute! How could there be SO MUCH cute?”

He smiled and kissed her again, venom causing emotional echoes they seemed to share. She was flooded with the buoying certainty that he understood anything and everything she could say or feel. He rubbed his nose with hers “Yes, Seleia. Now imagine that feeling. What it felt like when you saw her stretch or yawn, what it felt like to cradle her in your lap as she slept. What it felt like to stroke fingers through her fur so lightly that it did not wake her but she curled toward your hand because your touch pleased her.”

She did, lovely memories of purring and smiles.

“Without distress, look at how you feel about the idea that I could feel a similar, complex and rich joy when I look at you and when I touch you.”

Her head tilted in dreamy contemplation. There was a distant stirring of incongruous stress. She recognized it but it didn’t… pinch… like it might otherwise. “I… I’m not a kitten. It would make me feel too small for you, too soft… and I should be…”

“You should be what, Seleia? Find the conclusion you have drawn without judgment of whether it is right or wrong.”

“I should be strong for you. I should be strong enough to protect you. I shouldn’t be… that.”

“Tell me why you believe this to be so.”

Her brows drew together. She tried to be objective. “I’m young. I’m inexperienced. I’m… different. I’m going to be different. Maybe not in good ways. Maybe you think I’m going to be like my mom or my dad. I won’t. In the way that you understand social things… I don’t. I might not be able to. Ever. I want to travel and go to school. I don't know what I want to do with my life. Does marrying you mean I stay here? I don't know if I want to settle here. I might not be able to understand you or be able to be a good mother or a good farmer… I’m… afraid I’m never going to be the adult you need me to be. I’m also afraid I’m not… a kitten. If you wanted a Pon-Ifa partner for a lifetime, I could do that with no problem, but everything else? I’m afraid I can’t meet the standards you’ve set. That my parents have set. I’m good at books. I know Mindoir isn't the best place to pursue research. I'm afraid to leave. I'm afraid to stay. I'm afraid that I won't ever be strong enough to protect you like I want, and I'm not really a kitten like you want. Right now, I’m a seed… and maybe you want me to be a certain seed, thinking I’ll grow into a certain tree. But I’m going to be something else. You’ll be unhappy. That will make me unhappy. I’m not what you want. I don’t know what I am. I can’t tell you who I’ll be.”

The look on his face made her feel understood. He was her Senar. The smile on his lips, the expression in his eyes conveyed not trepidation but celebration and consolation. “Remember that I was there the day you were born. Long before you decided that you should be something to me or for me, you were who you were. If you wish to travel anywhere, Seleia, I wish to travel with you. Mindoir is a treasure, but your eyes deserve the right to behold the galaxy. Now is your time to explore and any threshold you cross, any room you inhabit is my desired home. I do not wish to rob you of discovery. I wish to share it with you. You named your kitten Boudica, after an Earth warrior queen, a woman of fierce martial Spirit. Why?”

“Cats have the souls of hunters. Somehow their predatory heritage can express itself in their behavior no matter how domesticated or pampered they are. She wanted to hunt. That’s what I saw in cat research and I saw it in her even when she was tiny.”

“Yes. You saw her as a kitten and also you saw to her potential and her lineage. I saw your glorious eyes as they first beheld your world and your family. I watched you sleep and stretch and yawn and I considered how anything could be so… cute… to use your word. Yet I was aware you came from a formidable lineage of extraordinary people in your parents. Your mother is a warrior queen. Your father is a creative genius. I have been blessed and grateful each moment for the opportunity to walk alongside the Fanning family and be counted among them. Whatever you potentially lack in the predictability or normalcy you believe you should possess you far more than make up for in the unexpected and unique gifts you embody. Mindoir in many ways is a gift of domestication and luxury, but that does not negate your inherent nature. You wish to learn. You wish to inspire. You have and you will succeed in those aspirations. Trust that I am wise enough to see the potential of your unexpected differences, that I cherish you and them. You understandably but needlessly fear aspects of yourself that I value in terms of past, present and potential. We can love one another and embrace our strengths and vulnerabilities. You need not be ideally strong or ideally vulnerable. You need only be yourself and I will treasure each moment.”

“Easy for you to say! You're ideally strong and I wasn’t a witness to every dumb thing you did when you were three years old. I'm embarrassed. A lot!”

“Cherish the opportunity to be young and inexperienced, Seleia, it will pass all too soon. I find you charming and endearing and I love you. That love will remain constant.”

She felt some of the sinking space of anxiety empty and equalize in pressure “But what about you?”

“What about me?”

“You know everything about me. What about you? Who were you as a baby? When were you cute? I mostly know you as protective and scary. You’re more of a dragon than a kitten.”

He was so handsome, even more so when he smiled like that, and that comparison obviously pleased him. His voice was humor rich as he bent to bite at her throat “I find I approve. Perhaps I will choose to be a Ti irr’aq.”

“A… tea rack?”

He enunciated the name against her throat “A Ti irr’aq, Seleia. A mythical dragon of ancient Rakhana.”

She loved his voice. She was losing some of the balance of attempted narrative, straying from the topic to indulge fancy. If he could accept her as childish, she could ask him again the question she had demanded so imperiously from a much shorter stature. She smiled and asked him “Please tell me a story.”

Her head fell back, mock feline entitlement implied in the arch of her body, a mysterious story-telling dragon-rasp to his voice as he obliged her. “The Ti irr’aq was a story of the Shal Clan. They lived in deeper desert than other Drell and developed watercraft that was unsurpassed, allowing them to live in territory that would kill others trying to reach it or survive there. Historically they were expert at locating, building and maintaining wells and subterranean cavern gardens. Much of their true craft is lost, never disclosed, but the myth was known on every thirsty dune. They attributed their successes to their Dragon Gods, the Ti irr’aq. A Water Seeker from the Shal Clan claimed to speak the language of the Ti irr’aq. According to them, only a young Ti irr’aq during the spawning season could be seen or heard. Elder water dragons were unreachable, having found homes deep underground where they coiled around and guarded their chosen water sources. A Shal Water Seeker claimed to be able to befriend a young Ti irr’aq and entice it to carve a well, to draw water to the surface and create the space for the gardens. The dragons were relatively small and spare at spawning, perhaps the size of a sky car. They were said to grow continuously as long as the water flowed, protecting the village within its shifting and expanding coils. Impressionable and thirsty, a young Ti irr’aq could be tempted to drink venom-sweetened water and promised more if they burrowed in the sand and drew the water up to the Water Seeker. They would bond in covenant and the Water Seeker would spend their life underground in communion with the dragon, trading venom and worship for water and food. Shal settlements built elaborate walls around them that resembled the sand-scoured spines and hide of the Ti irr’aq’s back to honor that the site was dragon blessed.”

“I don’t have any venom-sweetened water.”

“In this story, you are not a Water Seeker who cloaks her craft in myth. You are the water.”

She considered his place and his importance, asked “Why are you here? What brought you here?”

His weight was on her body, shifting, his hands holding her face, his eyes solemn and grave “You brought me here.”

“You were here before I was. You could have made a fortune anywhere, faced much more… interesting challenges than Mindoir’s security.”

He kissed her until she was panting from the combined effect of his rasping dragon voice and kiss hum. “Seleia, I was Called by the Sands to find you. I knew where you would be born. There is no more interesting challenge, no more important place in the galaxy to be than by your side. In this, you must have faith. Allow me to enjoy every moment of your kitten nature. A Ti irr’aq will never leave the spring that Called it to Coil. I promise you that your gifts will be shared with the Worlds, but not yet. For this precious moment, you are entirely mine and I am pleased.”

Venom induced acceptance of suggestion and myth, blunting edges of reality and allowing faith. His dragon story seemed to be definitive. Questioning it would be rude and she did not really want to anyway. He had told her his Soul Name and perhaps hers as well, shared secrets. He was her Ti irr’aq and she his Seleia... She found her way back to the beginning of the conversation “Then… Ti irr’aq… do you… want me to be… more demonstrative?”

He huffed against her skin, sat up straddling her hips and took off his jacket. Her throat went dry again. He was so beautiful. He took her hands in his, kissing them each in the center of the palm. With spreading hallucination and fascination he pressed them to his chest. “Seleia. You have recalled Boudica. Now I ask you to recall your first taste of chocolate.”

She grinned at the surging memory. “That is so distracting and unfair and chocolate was the best thing I’d tasted since my father’s bread.”

“Do you recall what you did after your first bite?”

She laughed “I think… I think I asked for more.”

“Indeed, you did. You, in fact, demanded more and I gave it to you.”

She tilted her head to the side, nervously laughing and blushing “I’m sorry…”

“Seleia, look at me. This is not a story or a space for sorry. That greed, that reaching joy toward what pleases you is a treasured response. If you could feel for my body the way you felt for chocolate at that moment, I would be pleased. You are perseverating on the subject of your perceived and projected inadequacies. You are mistaken. To explore desire, you must embrace desire. You do not wish to be a kitten, which you see as inexperience and weakness. You do not wish to desire chocolate, which you see as greedy. But I revel in your softness, your vulnerability, your desire and even your inexperience. Back to Boudica; when she was a kitten did you wish for her to be older, stronger, more of a huntress?”

Something in her mind shifted at that comparison, stress relieved from his flipped and fractal perspective. She hadn’t been wrong… just… incomplete. Another drawback to unique genius. She got used to being the only person who saw things the way she did. But he had the potential to understand her, to meet her there. “No… I wanted… I wanted her to be her. I wanted her to be happy. I wanted to make her days the best they could be. I knew she’d grow, but I never… wanted it to happen.”

“And further, you did not require her huntress nature. You wished to care for her and you wished to see her peacefully sleeping for as long as you could.”

“Yes.”

“Allow me the same luxury. Life will create change in you, as it did with Boudica. Life will create hungers, as it did for chocolate. We have yet to see what my body will bring you, but whatever that is, be assured that I do not wish to make you other than you are. Each moment of your life that you have shared with me has been a gift.”

“When… did you first want me?”

He moved her hands down his body slowly, along the defined muscle of his abdomen until her thumbs curled along muscle-banded scale at his hips, touching skin that now seemed like sand-scoured Ti irr’aq hide. He was bathed in golden glow, so very beautiful. He reached to the back of his neck and removed a small translucent disc. She was briefly distracted by that, but then dragon hide under her hands began to blur and glow with biotic blue at his flanks, causing her to dig in her nails. 

He was biotic? He’d been wearing an inhibitor? Why?

He stretched his neck and took a deep breath, then double blinked, reopened his eyes and looked at her. His eyes looked like those of a real Ti irr'aq. How would a villager feel if the dragon’s spines moved, if a Ti irr'aq’s head rose from the sand and spoke to them? Like this. 

Awe.

“Seleia. Listen to my words with your heart. Listen with your spirit. Have faith. I wish to give you full truth, but you might misinterpret me because each of my truths has layers of story and circumstance that cannot be disclosed Whole but must be discovered each in their turn and then reformed into understanding. If I tell you I wanted you the moment I saw your eyes… you would imagine me desiring an infant. The truth of your eyes as an infant was of need. At that moment I was your Guardian, as always. Yet know it to be true that I needed you before you were born. I knew of you. The Gods answered my prayer and guided me to you. The prayer is so, often repeated in desperation, in my need to find and to earn what my life required in Path and purpose: “There is a soul and when you sense them, follow them, lead them, cherish them, love them, for the choices you will make together will be greater than the choices you could make separately. Through them, you will be Whole.” Take this as a Drell truth, as my truth, as our truth. Someday you will understand. For now, find faith in depths of love that transcend desire and span lifetimes. I am your Ti irr’aq, coiled below the sand, guarding you. I will never leave. I will show you. Time will show you. I will show you time. Pass your hands over my skin and watch.” She moved, her fingertips curling along lines of muscle and stripe, green and black pearl bathed in gold and traced in racing blue. “I will always reach for you. It is not a thing of shame, but it is a thing of intimacy. My body and mind bear truths that have belonged only to me, truths I wish to share only with you in their mysteries and depth. My venom, my biotics, my answered prayer, hopes and stories are dowry gifts to treasure between us. Can you reach for me as you once reached for chocolate, with greed and joy? With demand if denied? That is how I reach for you.” He leaned down, blue force sparks along his lips as her nails dug into his skin. Her hips twisted against his thighs and he groaned, a Drell-dragon growl against her lips as sand-sculpted electrified hide crackled and flexed under her palms. The kiss suspended her in static and ecstatic, hair rising all over her body. 

“Seleia, the sands are deep, but they will speak. As you learn of me, of yourself, carry patience carefully in your heart. Savor our life by the moment. Savor who you are now and have faith in who we will be. Practice guarding new potential treasures we hold only in our eyes, our hearts, our minds and our bodies. Someday you will know everything, and each day in the future will bring new stories, just as I brought you stories each day of your life. As to whether or not I wish for you to be more demonstrative… my Seleia… yes. I do. That is but one layer of truth that I must speak because you ask, but I cannot explain that truth in words just as I could not explain what a kiss was, or what love is. It must be experienced. I want you to be more demonstrative… if and only when you wish to be more demonstrative. You must be certain. Living on a farm as your father’s daughter you know there is a perfect day, a perfect time to any harvest. Allow your desires to grow and do not rush. Allow me to enjoy anticipation.”

Put in that context it made sense, but what if she didn't… ripen… so to speak? “Do you think I’ll ever get there?”

“Seleia… I will make you a promise. Of all the clothes here, of all the clothes you might choose from the wider galaxy, order and wear what you wish. I promise to touch only what skin is bared to me. I will treasure what you offer. Trust that your eyes, your voice and the potential of our future together is my paradise. Each day I have spent on Mindoir in the heart of the Fanning family is a gift. I was celibate for my time here, embracing simplicity, which is not the same thing as seeking the simplistic. To extend the metaphor of food, your father's bread is simple in presentation yet complex in what it provides to those who eat it daily. It embodies repetition of the soulful like a prayer of devotion. He makes it for those he loves each day, each bite evocative of a thousand other bites. It is not a meal you would grow tired of having. You would joyfully try all the food of the galaxy, but that one bite is your ideal of simple and complex. You are my ideal and I look forward to shared experience, but I will ever value the authenticity of Mindoir and those who came here to cherish her gifts. Complexity for its own sake without Spirit to infuse it with meaning can be an empty, wasteful thing. I do not seek it. Nor will you. Was your life here unfulfilling without sex?”

She laughed “No. Occasionally confusing but no.”

“We shall live as we did prior, more in potential intimacy, which I treasure. If sex does not occur, Seleia, do not be anxious. Do you wish for me to wear gloves to spare you venom?”

“No.”

“Always feel free to ask me to cover my skin or stop touching you if it distresses you or if you fear the loss of will.”

“I think I… like it.”

“We have lived a life that resembles your mother’s form of push hands, Seleia. Our balance is developed and celebrated. Sex and desire have different requirements. Developed balance will rejoice in being overset or in oversetting. You might ask yourself how can you enjoy Pon-Ifa when it depicts war, when it is always zero-sum in potential. You enjoy it because it is your nature. I enjoy it because it is my nature. Within the zero-sum outcome is a subjective and objective experience of dynamic change, innovation and story. Whether we win or lose, it is our nature to play. Win or lose, we are spurred to play again and again. Imagine learning combat, learning how to fall. Imagine learning Pon-Ifa, learning how to develop ploys within ploys to deceive and conquer. Imagine me as an engaged Witness to your life and each of your spontaneous ploys as well as your greater ambitions. They are all beautiful, intricate things that bring pleasure in their mastery. Know this. I will take you down. Your balance will be overset. There are ploys within ploys. And yet you will never lose. We will always win.” Ti irr'aq intensity was taut in his body, biotic blue fierce on his lips, embodying a vibrant force of tension and pressure. “I just gave you a promise, my Seleia, to keep my hands from touching your skin. And yet I can always do this.”

His whole body lit up in racing biotic blue, the self-generated aura transferred to and through all of her, enveloping her, the field made of stasis, heat and unidentifiable elements that made her react with shock and open, instant welcome. It created a change of state in her body; solid to liquid, and a change of state in her mind; liquid to vapor. His primal dragon rasp and venom robbed her of any potential mental or physical balance as promised. “Seleia, find the pleasures in your mind that set your standards. Reach for me when I offer you a bite that appeals to you. It will never lead to corruption or evil gaining hold in our lives any more than keeping chocolate in the pantry would imbue our home with bitterness. I will protect you, I will cherish you, I will walk beside you and love you. When my whispers echo in your mind, when you invite my body, biotics, thoughts or touch to grace your treasured form, we bring our hungers and our complexity. You will scream for me. You may ask what is the joy to be found in screaming. I will show you. Defeat me at Pon-Ifa each day, Seleia, as is your due. My mind is yours. I surrender as I crave playing again and again, as I learn the glorious creations of your mind. But just as with sparring, my body touching yours is my realm. You will fall and you will be exalted. You will scream for me. You will need me to remind you to breathe. You will want more. Every. Day.”

His kiss was ravaging electricity and searing. All she managed in reply was a croak that wanted badly to be a scream despite all the reasons why she shouldn’t want that.

Sex was as complicated as love and they weren't the same thing at all.

She desperately wanted to know everything about both.

He gentled the kiss with soft consoling, witnessing murmurs, rolled to his side, readjusted them until her head was resting on his shoulder facing him. This seemed the perfect time to embrace kitten nature, so she did, granting him his desired due and allowing herself to be safe while scared. She thought about the difference between him being terrifying at her… and being terrifying for her. She was aware of suggestion, of persuasion and even of the careful conditioning of her life with him, but what delivered more proof of his patience than knowing he had waited four years to tell her that he knew she wanted him? She did love chocolate and kissing. She trusted him. If he was committed to being her Ti irr'aq, she would be his Seleia and trust that he was invested in her integrity of Spirit. She didn't have to change, but they could grow. One of his arms supported her shoulders, his hand stroking through her hair. He eased her chaos with his familiar comfort hum, the supernova of sensation and promise cooling physically but blooming mentally. His other hand trailed in the air inches from the profile of her waist and hip, creating a rain of warm blue starfall sparks through her.

Secrets mattered. She had never explained her synesthesia to anyone, not even her parents. She had been waiting for the day when she was sure she could explain it… and that day never came. He was explaining… how he couldn't explain, but he knew and he wanted to show her. She wasn’t anxious. She wasn’t ashamed of keeping the secret of her synesthesia. He wanted to give to her as much as she wanted to give back. She would love… did love… finding faith in him. In them. 

And may the Drell Gods have mercy on her.

She was so very lucky.

She made a sound of strangled whimper. His chuckle was warm with ‘I know something you don't know’ and then he said “Rest, Seleia. Consider our future. Think of what you want and then think of how to ask me for your desires, I will oblige you, I promise. I will make us breakfast.”

She whimpered again.

Breakfast was delicious; an omelet made with sharp cheese, habanero and black pepper, hot chocolate and kigi nut buttered toast from bread her father had made.

And she couldn't stop smiling.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kar ive'las - Drell for 'You speak the words of truth.'

Time passed and her curiosity grew as she became used to his promise of sharing his life and truth. When she asked him “What is a Drell wedding like? Have you been to one?” he smiled at her and lifted her in his arms.

“You have asked me a question that requires many answers. In this case, you will tell yourself.”

“What? That makes no sense…”

He kissed her brow and carried her to another… blank wall that turned into a staircase. And then they were in a sleek and expansive lab… beneath the extra ‘under’ and spawning even more questions. He met her shocked eyes with an expression of understanding patience. “Seleia, we chose that it would be best to reveal certain truths in this way. As you begin to understand the circumstances in which you find yourself, attempting to grasp them in isolated sections rather than immersion in a whole may result in wasted time and incomplete comprehension. I wish to grant you as much information as you feel you can absorb. As always, you can ask me to stop providing you with information at any point, though I suggest you listen and have faith that as improbable as this message may be, it is necessary that you hear it.”

She said a slow and stunned “Okay.”

He sat in a deep console chair with her in his lap facing a screen that wasn’t a screen and then was. And she was looking at… 

Herself.

Her smiling self.

Her smiling self, glowing gold as though swathed in synesthesia aura.

Her beautiful, smiling and glowing gold self, who said “Hey. This is going to be rough here for a bit but stick with me. We’re trying to make this as easy for you as possible. Very likely you just asked Senar a question that he can’t answer without telling certain truths, as though you cut below the skin and saw blood and asked what blood was. He thinks you’re ready to hear this and we don't want you under venom influence when you do because that affects your will, and we all want your will Whole. The simple truth, the answer to the question ‘what is blood’ is that blood carries life. But that’s not enough information to really understand it. To understand blood, you need to know about cell structure, the heart and the lungs and how they’re all connected. He wants to tell you. Needs to tell you. We tried to figure out how to do it without freaking you out thoroughly. So here it is: I’m a version of you. I’m glowing because Senar knows that you have synesthesia. I’m going to record several versions of this message and he will choose the one best suited, but I am betting this is the one he’s going to use. I am betting you did not tell him about it. Not because it was not important but because it was so very important. Just like I didn’t tell him. That’s a good thing because it gives us a chance to prove to you that there are things we know about you that you never told anybody. This is not an elaborate hoax. It is very elaborate, but it is not a hoax. Time travel is possible. Senar and I developed it. I belong to a different timeline. In my time, mom and dad died right after I turned 16. I joined the military. Senar has been telling you stories throughout your life. You think they’re fiction. They are his history and we need you to know about them because you both need to choose what to preserve, what to carry forward and what to change. You already know a lot. He can help you fit the pieces together and make the transition from fiction to reality and then to creating new Paths for yourselves and others. He told you of Limayeth Shepard, the Spectre. That is my story. He is Thane Krios, the assassin. He was wrist bound to Irikah and father of Kolyat. He joined Limayeth Shepard’s crew in the fight against Reapers. He’s told you other stories and he will clarify all of them when you’re ready. Fortunately, with time travel comes enough time to adapt and to choose. I have faith in you and so does he. Right now, you’re likely in shock but bear with me. There’s a way to provide proof of concept beyond this recording once you think through it. You know he could fake this recording and establish your memories and opinions with venom. His lifetime of guardianship should prove certain things to you that you will also think through. I am confident he will be convincing, but a dramatic gesture to reinforce faith might be of use. I want you to think of something completely random. Ask him to get it for you. He’ll have it for you already. He has lived this day already up to this point. He went back in time and he will have what you asked for. As a personal request, don’t ask him for a Tyrannosaurus Rex. He’ll do it without question for you despite it being flippant, potentially endangering history and definitely being unreasonable. He will not see flippant, endangering or unreasonable as unusual things coming from any version of us when a mission is involved. Try to take it easy on him. Ask.”

Senar paused the vid. Cara was dry mouthed, blindsided and shocked as she mentioned something in dream trance “A first edition copy of ‘Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman.’”

He smiled, reached to beside the console and then she was holding the book in her numb fingertips.

He pressed play while she blinked at the impossible. “Ask yourself why would he be on Mindoir dedicating his life to you. Your entire life. Every day. Look around at where you are, all the gadgets and technology you have never seen before. What could you possibly get for him that he couldn’t get for himself? Unless it was you? If venom could convince you of everything and this is all an illusion, that’s something you can’t change, so there’s no point in worrying about that. If you can reach for the strange reality we’ve imagined and are trying to build with you integrated, if you can figure out how to live there with him, you can make a lot of changes you want to see in the galaxy.”

Good point, me.

There was humor in Limayeth’s voice and she looked effortlessly sophisticated. She was as beautiful as mom was. Something to aspire to, again. “Okay. This is a lot. But we have faith in you. I have faith in him. Remember that. There are a lot of reasons to not trust him and he’ll likely tell you them all with a straight face and deny that he’s worthy of your attention except that he obviously is. Please, hug mom and dad for me. I miss them every single day. Please, take care of Senar for me. Please, take care of yourself for me. Everything depends on you. I have faith. So should you. I’ve recorded more messages, but for now, listen to him. Good luck. I wish I could be there, but I knew you would be there for each other. Now possibly with a problematic pet T. Rex.”

Her first instinct was to panic, but what carried through most to her was the information that her parents had died. 

She - her pronouns were wrong - I - she - we? Had a point that was unassailable in scale. Senar Tuelon - Thane Krios - that name brought memories of the bright, fanciful torrents of stories he’d told her as a child. She tried to hold that flood at bay for now. He did not have a motivation she could define. He could not be after wealth. She knew that ‘greed’ was a thing and that people gathered more money than they needed, but he had wealth she could not measure and if he wished to gain more it would have been a completely counterintuitive strategy to ‘head to Mindoir and babysit a little girl until she grew up.’ Shades of his stories started to materialize. He’d said that he knew where she would be born, that he had loved her from the moment he had seen her eyes. As Limayeth Shepard… over an Asari’s dead body…

As in Pon-Ifa - which he had taught her - look at the motivations. Look at the end game.

She suddenly believed viscerally that she had earned winning each match and he had not lied about that. She was what he wanted. It was consistent.

It was also impossible.

So is he.

So is this house - your home.

So is the book in your hand. Well, your lap. You dropped it. Hands are numb.

It was natural to panic. 

So don’t do what’s natural.

Having seen herself in gold with assurance and comfort in her voice, looking so beautiful, one piece of information separated from the others and flashed from real to not real to real again. It had been true then. It had been true for that glowing woman who looked so much like her but was so different. She knew he would answer her. She set her jaw “She said her parents died. Now I remember you telling me how. Show me.”

“Seleia, I wish to spare you the image.”

“Show. Me.”

“As you wish.” He reluctantly displayed the picture of Saoirse’s and Ronan’s charred bodies. She blanched. She got unsteadily to her feet, swayed and near stumbled as she walked to the bathroom with deliberation. He passed his hand over the image and cleared it. He heard the sounds of retching as he waited. He wanted to comfort her, but he did not wish to make the moment about him. After a time, she returned to him. She had not waited until the color was restored to her skin or the balance to her legs.

He saw in her, felt in her, the change in her demeanor, her carriage, her command. It was not unwelcome, but he despised her demand for raw, unfiltered pain.

She demanded more by asking “How?”

She would need to sort fact from fiction and he would provide. She would not be alone except in her demanded interludes, which would be brief. She needed him. 

He longed to pull her into his lap but restrained the impulse, sensing the transformation in her demeanor with acceptance and no little admiration. He was not surprised. This woman passed all Testings that involved the welfare of others. She only failed when the welfare was her own. He would look after ‘her own.’ He was her own. He told her “A Batarian raid.”

“Batarian? They’re real? They were only in the stories you told.”

He did not repeat the details of his story. He had told her carefully phrased and edited versions of Limayeth Shepard’s exploits. She potentially knew much of it, but she was human and had been told years ago. He did not know which parts of childhood fancy she had retained. She had been amused and thrilled by his tales when she had been younger. Each story had been intended to be remembered today, when he could unearth the mythical bones he had buried in time and bring them to life. “They have been confined to their own system after my interventions in their technical capacity.”

“Your… interventions?”

“Any action ‘I’ take in many ways is an action ‘we’ took. She and I. She made time travel possible. She does not necessarily approve of all of my choices, but she was aware of my intentions. She and I created the opportunity for this moment. Now you and I will carry it forward.”

“Why don’t I - why didn’t she - approve of your choices?”

“Because I am focused upon your welfare. She referred to this as romantic, but terrible strategy. I refused to alter time before your birth, which amounts to condemning every cycle before this one, though we do hope to save them at a later stage. She was unhappy with being unable to rescue me from the consequences of my childhood.”

“Why is my welfare a priority?”

“Seleia, you are my priority. You have been since I first saw you. You will be, always. Beyond that, you know of Reapers. They are neither mythical nor whimsical.”

“But you - she - stopped them. Thane Krios - died…”

“And became a God.”

“That does not explain why you are here, now, with me. You defeated Reapers. You saved the galaxy.”

“It was not saved enough for either of us. Time travel presented new options. This is too much at once. You risk shock.”

“Yes. But you… and she… have… risked so much more, haven’t you? I can recover from shock. My parents… could not have recovered from what you showed me.”

“Yes, Seleia. In many ways it is because her parents were not with her that I am here with you, with them, protecting their new future. She and I found common ground in this timeline. I have a moment in time that I will not risk altering and that is the moment of your birth. With me adamant on that course, she chose her own moment in time she would not risk permitting and that was the death of her parents. We had a shared set point of intervention.”

“Why isn’t… she… here?”

“I did not wish for it to be so. I wished to take the risks of intervention alone. I am a duplicate in a series of duplications. She was an Original in many ways and I would not permit further alteration. She ultimately agreed based upon the disparity of our capacities, particularly my memory. I was the only one capable of recording, recalling and reconstructing all events without distortion.”

Her brows drew together and she swallowed convulsively. He saw in her face the echoes of her protective need to rescue him and lure him from his bed before the Compact claimed him. He wished to pull her into his lap and kiss her until she forgot everything. The chaos of her expression and her internal turmoil were excruciating for both of them. He suppressed the need to reach out to her in so many ways and make her pain bend to his will, to Rightness. He stood, walked to her and smoothed a hand over her hair. 

Her voice trembling along with her lip she asked hoarsely “What happened to young Senar Tuelon in this timeline?”

His smile came with a thousand layers, glazed with his appreciation of her ability to find something he could not answer after his assurance of being able to give her answers. She alone found the doors to his helpless places, knocked and then picked the locks if denied entry. “That is a mystery. I cannot tell you where he is now. I intended to leave my counterpart entirely alone other than to monitor his life. I cannot explain definitively what has taken place, but I have a theory. Senar Tuelon does not exist ‘now.’ I can confirm that he was named as a candidate for the Compact. He experienced the majority of his celebration period but before his delivery to the Hanar to begin training he disappeared along with his parents and younger sister.”

“Well… good… right? That’s good?”

“I do not know. I attempted multiple time loops to intervene to restore them, but the loops fail, I recall nothing. Nothing is recorded.”

“How could that be? Interference from another time traveler?”

“Most likely. One with superior technique.”

“Her?”

“I believe the greater possibility is you. The future you.”

“How?”

“I told you the stories of the choices of the Crucible. She would have chosen Synthesis. I chose Control. Synthesis is the superior option. When we fully comprehended that and it became possible to alter history, we set to that course. When we succeed, you will have the time travel capacity developed by her as well as comprehension and power beyond mine. I was only granted Control over Reapers. You will be granted power over every living thing. She often expressed the vehement need to rescue me from the suffering of my youth. Once you know the extent of it, which will happen at the moment of Synthesis when all my experiences become yours, it is likely you would accept otherwise unacceptable risks to rescue the child I was from the life path forced upon him. I had thought she and I agreed that altering his timeline bore too much risk. I assured her I accepted that fate as necessary. It appears I have been overruled in many ways. I will not pretend that being overruled and hijacked is a unique experience in her company. This you well know, your ability to win Pon-Ifa submitted as proof.”

“Then that’s definitely good. Go me.”

“Perhaps. Time will tell us or you will tell me. Perhaps Senar Tuelon has been erased from the worlds and I am the only remnant, a disconnected echo.”

“Not if I can help it.”

“You do not know all yet, Seleia. Perhaps your mood and opinions will shift. I believe your verdict has already been executed and I am helpless to know what the future holds, if it will hold me, if you will hold me.”

“If she thought you were bad for history, the future or me, she would have cut you out entirely, preemptively. She’d have used time travel herself and gone far back enough to accomplish her goals.”

He beheld depths of familiar fluid comprehension in her eyes, in the dazzling storm in her mind, as though the unfathomed complexities of her sea crystallized and fractured and lit itself from within. Unstable and banked embers in him reminiscent of his first days of attraction to his Siha burst into answering conflagration. He smiled at her as his hand moved to slide fingers through her hair. “Beware such declarations, Seleia. When you speak so I find it difficult to resist demonstrating how much I wish to celebrate ‘now’ and damn every other moment and damn the Mission.” His thumb stroked her cheek. With great effort, he confined himself to kissing her brow reverently. He addressed the urgent flames that demanded he show her, now, exactly who they were together. He had thousands of years of memories of his Drala'tem, he should indulge in those. His need immediately protested that this woman was of the precious moment and she was his, that it was a Wrongness to allow another ‘now’ to pass not spent in full Communion. Beyond his need, she was isolated unnecessarily and he could transform that experience into bliss for both of them. 

He did not disagree.

Yet he had made her a promise and his readiness did not equate her readiness.

But by the Sands, she could be ready in a breath taken in time if he chose. He was approaching needing her forgiveness for so many things, why not this if at Synthesis she knew the full extent of the burning brand that seared and drove his need for them to be together always and in all ways. He still had no words to describe their Whole and Broken selves joining in Communion. She would know its potential power soon, but not the full grip of his obsession that was never sated, only appeased in its voracious need to possess and cherish each smooth and jagged line of her. He needed to feel her again and now and always, the unpredictable and intricate turns of her matching and clicking and turning the unseen in him. She was the key to his lock. He was the score to her litany. 

He feared speaking of her body and baring the truth twined in with Spirit and Seleia, that she was a Goddess fetish carved from the solidified ether of his primal and sophisticated desires. As a God with access to the minds of many, he had found no pinnacle of experience among them that compared in any magnitude to the sensation of his Communion with her. 

To her mind, that would seem an impossible and poetic exaggeration but to his potential for clinical accuracy and obsession, it was a Law of Nature. 

He had contemplated the simplistic and arbitrary nature of evolution driving organic minds to seek blindly idealized goals. He comprehended seeking warmth or food. How minds had organized themselves to favor ‘symmetry’ had eluded him except as a mystical undercurrent of mathematical truth. Warmth, food and shelter attained, something in the mind rose up to seek what was pretty and then possibly what was beautiful. ‘Pretty’ was perfect symmetry. Many people sought that, a warm and shallow pool of the falsely comforting, a trick of the brain, providing ease of guidance to those who do not realize that camouflage is a statistical probability. It was potentially soporific and smug when there was no threat, but it could mask real dangers, predictable as a venomous strike when ‘pretty’ gave a predator or parasite an opportunity to be perceived as partner or symbiote.

When an assassin was camouflaged as a lover. 

Yet there was a further fascination with what was important to survival coded into bodies and minds. Food was valued, therefore rotted food was repulsive. Life was valued therefore death was horrifying. That fascination could only be navigated by those who transcended instinct with reason. Shepard choosing to oppose all possible horrors, encapsulating and comprehending them was as unlikely as a moth deducing that open flame was to be avoided. 

Cara embodied for him what was most necessary in story, in spectrum; a beginning, a middle and an end.

She was not pretty.

She had the capacity for creation and comprehension of beauty and horror. She was never symmetrical except in overlay presentation intended to ease the dissonance of her true nature. She was broken, unpredictable, muted, overblown, too much, too little, herself.

His fascination with her resembled the satisfaction of beholding, holding and then being a blade forged by Gods and inhabited by the Spirit of a poet warrior. One half of her spectrum gleamed with the crafted danger of an obsidian knife, purposely knapped with edges and blood grooves, sharp edges and uniquely fragile substance. There was a calculated median in her nature the way a perfect blade had a point of balance, something he watched her navigate with alternate blitz force and graceful evasion. She had a handle that fit his hand, harmless and smooth and warm, alive. She tried to spin her balance to never cut him, tantalizing his reach and his grasp.

Meeting her, talking to her, touching her, watching her kill, at that time he had intuited but not been able to directly sense how unique she was as spectrum, as weapon, as falsely comforting archetype that concealed truths she knew others could not or would not comprehend.

Once he had Control he had been able to directly experience the pure sensation permitted by her as not an inanimate object like a blade but as a living being that embodied gifts that made her unique. It had been as though as a mortal he had been in a forest, drawn to one particular tree that was unlike any other. It was smaller, oddly colored and camouflaged in inexplicable ways to one accustomed to pretty and ideal. Focused upon sweet fruit he had dismissed the significance of the tree's presentation because he could not understand it. 

Then Godhood had granted him new senses and it was as though every other tree in the forest dimmed to dark, made of sap and wood and pretty, mindless striving toward sun or soil.

She stood out starkly, unforgettably, lit from within, not emerald or gold but every color possible in otherwise unimagined intensities and shades, obsidian-sharp knapped leaf edges glinting and racing with power, each stoma open. He was newly able to sense her writhing, seeking, glowing roots in soil that could not sustain her unless she sank deeper and sought to exhaust the Earth in which she grew, trying not to kill the entire forest by taking all the water, all the light, all the soil, vibrant and starving and fearing poisoning the ground with what she was, what she knew.

She was incandescent, nerves and brain cells firing at speeds unmeasured and colors unseen except with his new senses. Each cell in her body was metaphorically edged with force, plasma-nebula comets and fractal patterns blooming and shimmering in her mind.

It was not biotics potential. She was something new, generating and utilizing all the energy her body could produce with increases in capacity and efficiency, raising her from average human abacus to Cara-fueled mainframe. 

One of the unshown exhibits of the holographic dome was a projection of her brain in action from his privileged perspective. He could not find the words to describe it to her. Showing her the comparatively dull brains of others would test her camouflaging humility and draw her attention to just how profoundly he could objectify her. He had a spectrum as well and an obsidian-sharp tip at one end of it. He preferred she knew him by his handle. He did not wish to illustrate his uniquely Drell capacity for literal separation of her body from her Spirit. 

Communion was not classic battle sleep because it granted them symmetry and peace, her storm calmed and his presence possible. Otherwise, his visits to her mind would be like attempting to dive into the sun. As Control he had been able to access her recorded thoughts in a bright stream in the same way a camera could take pictures of a supernova. He could record remotely as a God, but attempting to inhabit her mind along with her meant he existed inside that storm, losing integrity of viewpoint as the pure energy flow of her swept anything resembling ‘him’ away without noticing his presence, like a lava flow engulfing an intended picnic hamper, the volcano unaware of a visitor upon her slope. 

It had been and was humbling, exhilarating, challenging and addictive to learn how to navigate her mind through a combination of techniques including slowing her down and speeding himself up. As a result, she was able to rest and he facilitated rejuvenation of the overheated structure of her brain. 

He had tried to use her as a model for redesigning his platform’s processors, but he could not navigate it at the speed she could, doing the equivalent of raising thoughts to spectacular velocity and then smashing them in jagged uselessness against walls of momentum that limited how much he could keep moving at once. Failure, collapse and frustration were the results each time he attempted it. He did not get better with practice. Watching her juggle uncounted, blurring torches he had wanted to gain the skill but had only arranged for metaphorically scorched hands, wasted time and a better-educated appreciation of her kinetic gifts. He functioned at a slower pace on fewer tracks with trajectories and momentum he could control.

When he had been an all-knowing and Controlling God, her chaos and synthesis spoke in ways he could not predict because she did not live in clarity or stillness. To experience being her was to experience the unpredictable ways that light could refract on and through complicated crystalline structure while both gem and crystal were spinning. She was carried by waves of intuition and calculation at her back that she navigated like a blind surfer facing the distant scent of the shore, balance responding to the vagaries of the sea. He only knew her actions fully once they were past. 

It was easy to read if she was hungry or if she was considering a thought or action that allowed shared language and symbol. It was impossible to know what she would do in her superfluid moments the same way it was impossible to calculate all the ramifications of a time loop. There had always been a wave at her back he could not see or predict himself because she never faced it, only waited for its lift and trusted to her navigation. 

Those waves had killed her once when he had not been there to save her. 

Time had swallowed his Drala'tem Whole. 

His Seleia would not drown. 

His cherished state of Communion was that of a man on a raft without a rudder, fascinated by storm, sky and sea at night. He hurtled into the fractal order and chaos of her physical composition, the shift of her hips when his cock was seated deep and frenzied, the sparkling dance of dendrites extending and neurons firing, her voice when there were no words, only storm surge as she navigated or drowned in the waves he became for and with her. 

She was art, the mysteries of her Spirit and Mind left for her to decide and for him to know later when he passed into the eye of her storm.

Perhaps she would despise him when she knew that her temple alone fascinated him, that he arranged for it to be empty of the Goddess that should dwell there. 

Perhaps she would appreciate that he, like she, found comfort and beauty in pure physics and chemistry. 

He believed that once she knew the full possible spectrum of who she was and who he was, who they were together, she would be too curious and ambitious to deny herself half of everything because there might be risk. She would want to understand everything.

As a child he had warned her of her heedless nature, told her often to be patient, to be careful, knowing she would become compelled to follow any mystery.

He strove to be mysterious.

At the center of my greatest achievement is darkness, Seleia. I seek to banish you from your temple, not to desecrate it, but to kneel at your altar in peace. It will ever be so, and I doubt that any transformation of the galaxy will change the fact that I am a dedicated addict and I wish no other state. I desire the expression of selfish, hungry and craving truths and you must accept that or end me as a Mercy, for that is your nature. 

How and why he was so certain followed the template of a black hole that created as a side effect but devoured as its nature. 

She would Know, but by the Sands, not today. 

The clinical procedure of duty and waiting was interrupted by him wanting her. Now. In the chair they had vacated. He would strip the faux-Mindoir field drudge clothing from her and claim his Manipar. He did not want to loop time any further. He wanted to be the tested and final version of ‘him,’ his patience and shed skin of paternal interest in the past. He felt the full driving and spurred force of cramping need and addiction to her, to them, the need to make the most of newly possible potentials dig in deep and dark. 

He had the habit of years of being able to purely focus upon her. That was satisfying in itself, but it had grown to orders of magnitude sweeter as she purely focused upon him. 

Familiar and new fires raged as he trembled. He had hoped his greed for her and his sense of identity and possession would not be of this magnitude. He had hoped to be a better man. That would not be so, but he would provide for her to be a better Goddess. He measured his fragile restraint and questionable motivations. She would know. She would measure them herself as his Judge soon enough. There was less shame than acceptance in that destiny. She would know the depths of his obsessions. This self, only hours old, had already accumulated the full count of his struggle to control himself. 

She was not afraid. She trusted him. He held her as she stepped into his embrace. He enveloped her in the lie that had to be the truth for now; that he could and would control himself and not rip choices from her.

She whispered “So. There’s a lot to explain to me, huh? Seems the story of Limayeth Shepard has a few more chapters?”

“Thirteen thousand years of the unknown, yes, much of the truth unsuitable to a child delighting in distraction.”

“So. The question that led to this… you have clearly been to a Drell wrist binding. Were you and she… me… was her name Limayeth?”

“She chose the name Lal Shepard. However, I could not use that name in story for obvious reasons. Limayeth is a nickname granted by Garrus Vakarian.”

“Who was her bond mate.”

“Yes.”

“And Thane Krios died at the Crucible taking Control.”

“Yes.”

“But there’s more.”

“Very much so.”

“So did you… eventually… have a ceremony?”

“Not one we chose. Based on the technology used to resurrect her she was a Reaper. The galaxy was transformed as a whole, granting me omniscient knowledge of and Control over her. In terms of ceremony, it was definitive. We kept the secret between us.”

All she had was a stunned “Oh.” 

Receiving information was not the same as absorbing or processing it, and ‘real’ was encroaching. “Seleia, to me you are self I long to reclaim in any capacity you allow. She was not my wife. There was no ceremony. What would be our vow? Who would officiate? Who would witness? She was my self. We lived secluded. I built a home for us on the planet I showed you that I described as ‘The Shores.’ Any desire she felt I would fulfill, it would be satisfied as my own. Our own. No ceremony could describe who we were, what we did or how we did it. It is as though you are asking me if I ever had a ceremony that bound my left hand and right to move together. Other than birth, no. Most ceremonies signal a choice, implying it can be reversed. Marriage ceremonies have correlating divorce decrees. A traditional marriage can be chosen by members of a group and that same group can reaffirm the ceremony as participants or witnesses. Our fusion was forged not by knowing what would happen but by me being unwilling to allow her to die. Our joining was irrevocable. She had near unlimited raw and refined power granted to her through my capabilities. We set to healing the harm history had wrought. She deserved protection, adoration, worship and peace. She would not take it except to please me. She took it because she considered it her job to please me just as I considered it my job to serve her. Consider the myth of human Heaven. She indulged me as a God who had created her personal heaven, but did not accept it as a potential reward for her service or her ultimate home. She utilized it as a place where she sought to aid others. Had she been a human mortal ushered beyond the Gates into Christian Heaven, offered immortality and peace, she would have not remained there. She likely would have obtained an audience with God, found Him wanting and used His resources to facilitate her plan to uproot His Throne and tyranny. She would and did defy each God she encountered and created. She would defy God, Heaven, Hell and the Devil to set those in Hell free. We did all we could from our Heaven and then she conceived of a raid upon Hell through the use of time manipulation. I do not doubt she will succeed. Without her in my mind, I would have chosen pure Heaven and Godhood, wanting nothing more than to create and maintain her bliss. Perhaps you can understand why seeing you happy and unburdened is of therapeutic value to me and not something I consider to be a chore or frivolous. Yet I know you will not stay here. We could remain here or anywhere together, set in a time loop of ignorant innocence. As much as I might rejoice at your refreshing change in tactics and join you there, you will not choose that. Defiance against the laws of physics themselves, particularly entropy, is your nature in any timeline. It is not something I wish to take from you. When I encountered her, she seemed a theoretically small, frail and vulnerable woman I could crush under a palm strike in seconds. At the time my primary ambition was death; delivering it and ultimately earning the right to experience it. I had destroyed my life and my family. I bore a burden of sin that demanded death and damnation as justice, torment as vengeance. I expected to spend eternity with my Spirit lost and blind, wandering the poisoned sands of Rakhana, battle-sleep bound without a body. I knew the Shores were not a place for me. Yet once I saw her eyes I could not fail to follow her. She could not fail to defy my Path if it led away from Rightness. Her mind invested me with glow when she first beheld me. I invested her with divine Judgment. Without her, I would have died in unidentifiable obscurity, unloved, diseased and irretrievably shattered of Spirit.”

Her arms tightened around him and he was at peace as she murmured fervently “Not. This. Time.”

“Kar iva’las, Seleia.”


	5. Chapter 5

Tapping her fingers as she read on her Omni-Tool about Reapers she muttered “How often in this timeline have I decided my husband is crazy?”

The second level of his home had a priceless library of original works of history and art as well as instantly created copies of anything in physical format. She cross referenced too much and wanted the hyperlinks of her Omni-Tool for study, but he was paging through a physical book she couldn’t identify because she didn’t recognize the language. Just like eating, he said reading was something he chose to do for pleasure. His home life seemed to consist of being available to her. He cooked, cared for the maintenance of his - their - on come on, it’s his, I can at least admit that I still don’t think any of this is ‘mine’ inside my own head - home in terms of aesthetics and keeping plants alive - plants that were also priceless works of historical art. The place seemingly cleaned itself, she’d have to ask him how. She could do with being fascinated by a Reaper vacuum cleaner for a few minutes rather than studying how a husk was made. She believed his reading was a theatrical action intended to put her at ease. She doubted that before she got here, he had spent his time turning pages. Even the holographic dome was for her benefit. He could instantly have access to anything he wanted to know or experience with his Control library and Drell memory. She supposed she was grateful that he didn’t spend his days sitting eerily still and staring at her or at walls, that he went out of his way to appear casual amid all the insanity she was trying to study. Who ‘he’ was would be a mystery for a while. Maybe he’d placed himself in stasis at night. Maybe he’d stared at walls, rapt in tu’fira with Limayeth. Right now, his work was over, his objectives achieved and it was up to her to catch up. He looked up and smiled at her “You never say so out loud, but your expressions are not well guarded. At this point in time you are prone to disbelief and denial, though you are attempting to compensate and managing well. You do think I am crazy. You think you are crazy. You are perhaps not wrong in either case, making dismissing the premise of insanity difficult. Yet your mind quickly adapts to presented information. It is one of your inherent talents. Your curiosity will not permit you to run screaming into the night. You wish to hear the end of the story. Always.”

“Is this your first time through this timeline? Other than the time-traveling book?”

“This far advanced on Mindoir, yes. The book is a reproduction created here. My thanks for the relative ease of providing your selection. The genuine first edition is on order and will be delivered. I admit to anticipation of your reaction and only resetting time to this morning. The last reset was made three months ago in order to adjust factors beyond Mindoir, not to your life. My mission began with making loops at intervention points where your personal timeline was not involved. I could not make many changes to human, Drell, Turian, Citadel or Batarian history that I had wished to see because it would have affected whether or not those I know as family were born at all. After your conception I changed Mindoir’s history drastically in order to improve access to technology and security, eliminating the sense of isolation and deprivation that grew throughout the original timeline. I became primary stockholder and client of the Mindoir venture through corporate entities, influencing policy and ensuring generous profit. Attempting to alter the starting conditions of the colony created changes in your parents’ experiences, resulting in you not being born. The same happened with attempting to befriend your parents before your conception. I could only make my appearance physically and financially in the colony after your mother was pregnant. As examples of required loops, there had been a fungus introduced to Mindoir from a shipment of tainted seed, resulting in the soil being aggressively colonized by it. The settlement would have inevitably collapsed in viability. There was one particularly unstable colonist who did not adapt well to transplantation from Earth, resulting in homicide. The homicide did not affect you directly but it would have changed the ideal environment I require as your proper setting. Loops can vary in duration from years to hours. The fungal colonization of the soil required a three-year reset to eliminate its dispersal along trade routes. In the case of the disturbed colonist I arranged for early warning, treatment and transport back to Earth, the loop consisting of a week. You died once from an allergic reaction to a mutated crop’s pollen. It happened when you were four years old, resulting in resetting the timeline back six years to before the grain was genetically developed in order to avoid the deaths of other human children across the galaxy. I have experienced your birth seven times. Your mother was once severely injured due to random accident. She would have lost her left hand. I reset the timeline by three hours and prevented the circumstances from recurring. I have traveled farther forward in Turian development or Batarian development to see what occurs there, but I have not traveled forward from this moment in your history. Cultural and technological timelines required specific historical alteration of key events, otherwise little personal investment of time. Your life requires my participation each day, future observation useless as a tool. Everything is subject to reset if circumstances prove unfavorable. I have spent subjectively seven hundred and fourteen years adjusting the outcome.”

“How old are you?”

“In linear terms a few hours. In nonlinear terms, approximately fourteen thousand years. In networked terms, with Control I accessed trillions of active platforms and the life memories of those taken and preserved throughout the Cycles by Reapers, granting me subjective accumulated experience measured in duodecillions of years at the moment of Control with the streaming memories from living and synthetic platforms contributed in real time. I hold all of Senar Tuelon’s personal memories and experiences as well as Limayeth’s. I embody extensive technological, historical and experiential databases, more information than is possible through storage methods you know by magnitudes of order. You have access to that information. I will not implant the information into your mind, you must learn it. I will not risk making you a Reaper by definition by significantly altering factors that would inherently change your mind or body. You enjoy study, so we will do what has always worked by granting you a puzzle, information about that puzzle and enough time to develop your solution. My presence in your life has been one of optimization without alteration. The odds of Synthesis being reached and my Control being asserted over you again are low with the precautions we have taken. My Control over Reaper technology existed only in the other timeline. I no longer have access to direct Control, but I do know everything about their operations and capacity at this point in time. I have not attracted the Catalyst’s attention because the lineage of the technology I use in this timeline is unrecognizable to it in many ways, as am I. I am not a Reaper by definition and the Catalyst is not Control as I was. At the beginning of the Cycles it created policies and put them in motion along with slaves to carry out its will. It created a hierarchy that it observed but did not interact with or alter. When the Catalyst gave my predecessor Control, it was an act of creation. It did not make me in its image, but did grant me power over its hierarchy. My acts of creation in that timeline carried forward Reaper technology and platforms that were connected to me and defined ongoing Reaper evolution. Drala’tem drew from non-Reaper thought and innovation to develop new lines of inquiry. Over time, working through non-Reaper agents, she bypassed the lineage of ‘Reaper’ origin and developed a new technology tree. We determined it was the act of creation and observation of that creation by a networked platform that defined Reaper status. She painstakingly developed new hardware and software. She fostered methods of artificial thought and automated objectives that she influenced but did not direct, a blind hierarchy of her own. She isolated the conditions of Reaper lineage and then manipulated raw theory in order to ultimately eliminate Reaper influence. I confirmed that the technology she was developing was not under my Control. She was always under my Control, I knew of her intent but was blind to and separate from the creation process. It was as complicated as creating unique life from amino acid building blocks in the dark with no tools. She spent several hundred years on that, hopeful of her goal but reliant upon luck at first to create anything usable that had not already been developed or appropriated by the Reapers. She rebuilt technology through simulated proxy. As eezo was extensively used by Reapers, she avoided it. She created unique fuel for unique constructs. She developed new information theory, propulsion and travel methods to create a network I did not Control, therefore the Catalyst could not control or exploit. Her innovations are in the library, her networks can be rebuilt. This was done to make me undetectable, time travel unable to be hijacked and to ensure Reapers would not be able to claim ownership of any technology or person by definition before, during or after Synthesis. Developing time travel itself was an easier endeavor and took less time. My integrity as a platform is not as precious or variable as yours. With each alteration of time my platform is obliterated as one is created in the past. To ensure the mission, there are redundant time travel arrays sown throughout the galaxy, established far back in time and enduring far into the future. As I persist, I send a signal through time preventing the triggered formation of a new platform earlier in the timeline. If I were unable to report there would be a new platform created with access to all collected data from the future platform’s experiences. That platform would then set about the objective again. That has not been necessary; objectives and infrastructure have remained stable. The only objective remaining is Synthesis. My methods of transportation on and off the planet if necessary are undetectable by current technology. I constructed this base centuries before Mindoir was colonized. The upper cosmetic level was added after my official arrival here. My body is Drell according to current scanning technology as well as to in-depth medical analysis, but what I am and what I can do amounts to immortality and control over time that cannot be taken from me.”

She was lightheaded. How was she ever going to sort through all of this? His book caught her eye and she was reminded of her question of what… who… he was when he wasn’t trying to appear to be someone or something she could understand. “If you’re not… biologically… Drell… why sex?”

“I am invested with desire for her that began the moment I saw her eyes, Seleia. It was possible that I would love you merely paternally, my tu’fira reserved for her. Romantic involvement was not a mission objective. Yet she believed you would be prone to finding me attractive. She knew I would get you anything you needed. She believed you would need and want me. Part of my tu'fira of her was her smile as she assured me it would be impossible for you to resist attraction to me. She insisted I be as I was when she first saw me. She told me to not deny you of the gifts of venom and voice. In her mind was the evocative image of Drell-imbued phosphorus plunged into human-imbued water, evoking blinding fire surrounded by her synesthesia’s golden glow. Unspoken but not unmarked, she was approaching jealous for her, but her main prediction was of excitement, hope and assurance that I was destined to be loved by you. I saw her prediction come to pass. You found my shoulders to be ‘very important.’ Your eyes, Cara, are the same. My need to follow you wherever you lead and to insist upon that as my fate holds as a Signpost upon my Path. You ask me would I ever give up being your partner and lover if it were possible. I will ask you - would you ever give up being your parents’ daughter if you could choose your form?”

“Never.”

“Agreed. Now you may see the superimposed image of your parents’ deaths when you look at them. They will not mean less to you, they will mean more as layers of Sand and depth of coil are added, spoken or unspoken through time. You are not less to me. You are more. You will always be more.”

“So, you altered time… to save me. If you have all these abilities in the future, why aren’t I saved then?”

“The death of her parents, her death and resurrection as well as circumstances leading to her discovery of how to save the galaxy from Reapers created conditions that contributed to more pain than she could bear. She had lost love, she had broken faith, she had been betrayed, she had been undone. Those were deep and complicated injuries that did not heal in many ways. She still functioned, but it was always with the burden of those losses borne as a price to be paid in pain and suffering, like a poisoned dagger buried in her heart she could not remove. As Shepard she had had her hopes and ambitions, her love, her life, her identity, wrenched from her. She ultimately considered them to be strategic liabilities and chose to do without them. The circumstances of my Control made it impossible for her to establish them independently. If I tell you I went to all this trouble to bring your parents with you into the future, that would not be the wrong answer. It would be incomplete, but not wrong. The loss of them was the first unhealable injury in her. She memorialized them daily, built herself into a woman they would be proud to call their daughter. Their inspiration carried her through thirteen thousand years of trials. She never forgave herself for allowing them to die. She never forgave herself for being a Commander before being a bondmate to Garrus. She never forgave herself for allowing me to take Control. For my part, I have a personal motivation to cultivate in this brief interlude in time. Here and now I have the opportunity to experience being the focus of your attention.” He could tell that at the moment, Garrus Vakarian was of no interest to her and he was perfectly willing to allow that to stand. She was consumed by parents, him and galaxy and that suited his pride. “You wished to see the picture of your parents. Do you wish for me to reset time and keep that image from you? I can do that. By your order, I can lie to you, keep that from you, and ultimately you would know it was by your order that it was done, that I kept faith.”

“No. Have I ordered you to lie to me before?”

“To disclose how I would behave, Seleia, if I deemed it necessary to the mission I would lie to you and tell you convincingly that you had not and to ask you to have faith in me. Here I ask you to have faith in us. If you had authorized it at any point in any timeline, I would use venom or time loops to assure your lack of curiosity and maintained ignorance. In that case, it would be something you consented to and something we did together. I would be protecting you. It happens to be true that I do not have to lie because you never choose to place me in that position and you bear pain yourself always. It is paradox unique to time travel, but you must have faith that if I were to lie to you, it would be for the best and by your will. Intellectual knowledge of past-suffered pain may be necessary to complete your purpose and honor your nature, but preventing you from experiencing them is my mission and I will achieve it. I will warn you away from and if necessary loop time to avoid certain things such as death by pollen or the loss of a hand. Being exposed to certain thoughtforms without sufficient immunity to them is as debilitating if not more so than paralysis or loss of limb. You require deep wellsprings of faith, trust and information to face our past and future. I have attempted to maximize your access to those resources and prevent any poisoning of those potentials. She knew the direct and helpless experiences of rabid hatred and pain injected into her mind and body. You are safe and that is not an illusion. She was never safe and that was her reality. You will know her as history. Learn of it, honor it, but do not strive to become it or her. Can you see the wisdom in that? That one can learn of witch hunts and not volunteer to be burned at the stake in order to understand why we protect the vulnerable from the powerful? That sexual abuse is vile and you need not be brutally raped to wish to protect the innocent from the predatory? That you need not experience the suffering of terminal illness in order to wish to heal the sick?”

‘Yes.”

“Excellent. I agree. You bear an abundance of the need and motivation to protect, to heal and to innovate. I beg your cooperation in keeping it so without reckless martyrdom in the name of comprehension. Have faith. I am here because, in order of priority, you should be Whole, your parents should be with you for eternity and so should I. There are other priorities and other people we wish to carry forward with us. Her bond mate, Garrus Vakarian, is of great concern. Not only to her but also to me. To compensate him for the potential temporary loss of the eternally priceless, where and when he is has been improved from his original timeline. He originally led a difficult life that carried events she did not know took place but I did. He spent much of his life marginalized for a choice he made in his youth. After intervention and alteration through time, the hastatim ceased to exist after his birth and radical political climate alteration assured that biotic and male Turians were granted greater opportunity and civil rights. The Hierarchy and the Citadel are transformed. The same is true for Hemorus Yiansoc. He will lead his clan from obscurity to prominence. She agreed that the circumstances of Hemorus Yiansoc, Lal Shepard, Thane Krios and Garrus Vakarian meeting and working together carried too much freight in suffering. It appears Senar Tuelon will not need to endure the Compact, Garrus Vakarian will not need to endure his tenure at the hastatim, Hemorus Yiansoc will not endure years of torture in the form of suppression of his biotics and will not reject his clan. They are the men you knew, only their story changes temporarily, just as yours has. They, like you, are now safe. You will all be brought to the future Whole, able to choose who to be and who to be with. They were not consulted or asked for their cooperation in being protectors of Turian integrity. It was unnecessary. They would have always fulfilled that role. I have made it easier for them to obtain the authority to express their natures.”

“She loved Garrus?”

“Beyond the capacity of most, but not beyond his capacity to love her in return.”

“She loved you?”

“Yes. But where she and he were peers and protectors who called to each other through service and similar nature, I was by nature a predator. She and Garrus Vakarian were alike in heart and sacrifice. Garrus Vakarian and I were alike in the relentless need to pursue her and possess her as our mate. You and I are alike in intellect and ruthlessness of purpose.”

“And are you a predator now?”

“That is ultimately for you to decide once our mission here is complete. We will know your judgment at Synthesis. I am hoping that through thousands of years of labor and devotion, I can earn what I stole.”

“You’re hoping that the lives of my parents will do that?”

“I know you, my Seleia. You were essentially two women; Cara Fanning and Lal Shepard. Cara Fanning never had the choice to save her parents and condemn the galaxy to Reaping because she remained a contented farmer on Mindoir. Lal Shepard would always choose to sacrifice Cara Fanning and her parents because she would always accomplish her mission of saving others, and she did. And she will. Now we can choose to have both.”

“Because you carried each of the memories of the original pain and trauma and you were dedicated to a bond’s potential that wouldn’t have existed otherwise.”

“Indeed, I do and I did. Each member of our family works hard by their nature and achieves the greatest good in any iteration. We believed that certain things in us all were, are and would be destined. I hope to preserve, not erase the litany of her scars. Remember her prophecy of phosphorus and water. They will react to each other spectacularly regardless of the manner of meeting. The only way to create unbroken skin for you was with a time machine. I am introducing the truth that not being scarred holds value, holds meaning. I will protect your body and your Spirit. We will find our way to the future and you will know my mind. You will bring your parents with you. You will know Garrus Vakarian. You will rediscover your family and create more and you will understand why thousands of years of time spent to buy your Whole body and Spirit is romantic and strategically flawed, but it was a necessary step on the Path. You will see that I created choices, took responsibility for the failures of my nature and chose to honor her more than her pain. My gift to eternity is you, Whole.”

“What do you think I am going to do when I know everything you know?”

“I believe you will want to know how our story does not end. She had thoughts as she developed time theory and method. She began to believe everyone throughout history could be rescued. She postulated that each living creature constituted is its own universe, its own source of power and data storage. She was conceiving the next generation of time travel hardware with drastically reduced power cost. Synthesis is one step in her plan. I have faith you will reach your as-always unreasonable and unreachable goals that you inevitably reach. I wish to be there, to see what you will do, to be part of it. Perhaps you find a way to rewrite everyone's litany of scars throughout time, not only in this galaxy but in the greater Universe. Perhaps each living creature in the past or future in the Universe is a piece of a scattered puzzle and when you place them where they belong according to your vision they will finally create a Whole. I believe you will create unforeseen miracles. In me, you will find the brief and faltering life of a flawed and broken Drell man who loved and loves you. You will know I devoted myself to you. You will see the choices of thousands of years in her service. You will also see my lack of empathy, my lack of vision, my willingness to seize you and your potential. That may amount to your judgment of me being unforgivably selfish, which I would accept. But perhaps my taking her will from her was a required condition for the salvation of history and the end of suffering. She ultimately believed that to be true. Had she taken Synthesis she would have saved the future but not been motivated to reach back and save the past. If you choose to end me, I know it would be painless and instant. Allow me to say my goodbye now. My life at your side has been, will be and would have been glorious. Eternity would never have been enough time with you. If I am gone or if you choose to keep me, perhaps you will choose to come to this moment and remember this scar.” Blue shimmered over his skin as his arms moved to pull her to him, as his lips lowered to hers. His hands tangled in her hair and she kissed him back because it was what she wanted to do as the echo of screams and smoke was notable in its absence. 

Her parents were alive. 

He was crazy. 

He loved her. 

She loved him.

She could do a lot with that. She murmured with tears streaming down her face and a wobble in her voice and knees “Your wife decides you’re crazy at least once. And so very romantic. She doesn’t care much about the strategy right now, but believes you when you say she will later.”

He framed her face in his hands, his expression holding impossibility and humor “Your husband believes the entire evolution of time was of satisfying value because he was able to defeat his wife at Pon-Ifa. Finally.”

“I’m that good?”

“You’re better.”

“I begin to see why kittenish behavior could be therapeutic for you.”

“As always, Seleia, the only way I can win is to cheat.”

“I was seven! You cheated?”

“In the sense that I used a time machine to oppose you before you had developed gambits that Drell history had not produced.”

“You joined her when she was 30 years old… ish… How long do we have to… save everyone?”

“In linear time, fifteen years from now in the original timeline she ended the Reaper threat but not the Reaper legacy. Time as a resource is flexible. We can loop in more infinitely and alter the appearance of your relative age cosmetically if you require it, but I believe we have ample time. You need not fight or fire a shot. Choose a day once you feel you understand the choices you will be responsible for making. I have the means to create the opportunity for galactic Synthesis with you as the template. It could be done tomorrow if you wish, but I would prefer you took the time to think about what it is you wish to create. The future always benefits from your contemplation.”

“It is actually possible that I will… comprehend it? Did she comprehend it then?”

“No. Attempting to comprehend broke her in many ways. You will not risk being broken, but you also cannot embody galactic understanding before it is granted. You can embody the will to be a thoughtful Goddess and engaged creator.”

Right. That. Rather than a bewildered, rushed and potentially clueless child who might be overwhelmed or panicked, risking forming the new Galaxy with those emotions woven into the fabric of creation. “Okay. Where do I start?”

“With your favorite pastime, Seleia. Study.”


	6. Chapter 6

His databases were extraordinary things, just like his shoulders. She learned of future-past histories and potentials. He answered her questions but as this was all past to him, he was less interested in what she was learning than in her.

He insisted on cooking for her. He insisted on holding her. He helped her choose a simple marriage ceremony that was suitable to Mindoir, human in tradition. He made her a dress and suggested wildflowers for her hair. The ceremony would take place next week in a community of those who did not know they did not share the same choices. She tried not to feel guilty or unworthy, focused on the ambition to eventually, through time, grant everyone freedom.

She was blessed with the potential reality of being not only the happiest woman on Mindoir but likely the happiest woman in history, past and future. There was no limit to what she could learn, what she could do. Every problem had a solution and enough time and energy to formulate and execute it.

He often left her to study relatively undisturbed, but she LIKED the way he disturbed her.

He insisted on meals with her parents often and meals with him always. Her standard protests of racing anticipation and wanting to rush through it all as though there wasn’t enough time collapsed before his reminder that there was infinite time but not infinite ripe vanisfruit. Unless of course she wished to disrupt the timeline because she could not pause briefly in her study. He could hold the fruit in stasis, of course, if the prospect of his company was inconvenient.

She had to concede. Even though she knew he could just make vanisfruit in the lab, that wasn't the point. Given a choice in terms of food he preferred original components and the skill to cultivate and prepare them. The vanisfruit was from a grove of trees he had planted at her birth. 

She learned that in the original timeline, Limayeth had been vegan, would not touch alcohol and that ‘ascetic’ and ‘stubborn’ were understatements regarding her deeply defensive life and choices. Except, he pointed out, she had a habit of consuming as much sugar as she could, secretly, stockpiling impressive hordes of cookies and candy. 

So, some things stayed the same.

He said it was because her brain and metabolism were unique and burned fuel at impressive rates, that she should not miss meals and should not limit calories. 

She was still vegan and didn’t drink alcohol, but those were choices, not default states of living intended to keep a connection to dead parents. It was hard to tell how much Senar had influenced those choices. He had always been vegan and had chosen not to consume alcohol, though he had tried meat and alcohol in his lifetime. Limayeth had chosen to not eat meat for ethical reasons rather than ideological, and had chosen not to drink alcohol because she did not want her brain chemistry altered. Senar supported those final choices, though he asserted meat and alcohol were and always would be options.

She just didn’t want to take it.

Possible self-fulfilling prophecy. Possible tendency. Maybe she’d leaned his way to even the odds. Her mom and dad had always provided meat-free options when Senar was dining with them, which was so often that Cara had always wanted to eat what he was eating to keep him company, to not make it three against one or humans against Drell. They were always a team in her mind, like her parents were a team. That made it even, and that made it win-win.

So, she’d had her eating habits dictated by circumstance and social pressures and internal judgments, just like everyone else. She was glad they were the way they were. Now they were an official team. As long as there were chocolate and cookies available, she didn’t miss the other options. Imagining her father without his home-brewed mead and her mother without her love for steak was foreign. 

As Senar set her work-of-art plate before her, his fingertips strayed to her upper arm, the moment evoking a shiver. He said contemplatively “You have entirely different freckles.”

“You memorized my freckles?”

“It is the nature of Drell to memorize. There is the litany of scars and the litany of skin. Not knowing each freckle, each thought, is tempting.”

“So, me keeping my skin covered...”

“Provocative foreplay.”

“And the Drell scores another point for predatory tendencies. “

“I proudly own so many of those. I will not attempt to deny it. I am looking forward to infinite opportunities to accumulate more. I am not convinced eternal life would be worthwhile without them.”

“And you never got tired of… the same freckles?”

“Do you get tired of breathing? I spent thousands of years in Communion with her, the loss of that sensation required that I replay and recall what we were like together. I was constantly fed by her inspiration and now yours because it is as necessary to me as breathing. She helped create memories and sensations, feelings and inspirations for me to bring with me.”

“What did she say? What’s your favorite?”

His mouth explored new-to-him freckle constellations on her arm, his lips causing shivers, his hands on her back. Light sparks and vapor trails from that little bit of venom teased the edges of her vision. “Of the presented and framed thoughts she gifted to me, she wished primarily for me to have faith and to know that all would be well and that she trusted in my choices. Yet there was nothing so precious to me as the stirring in her of the desire to have children.”

“You had no children?”

“She feared it. In the beginning she wanted to embody a chosen support role. She believed it was the only way to avoid power struggle with me. She was not incorrect, but it was also impossible for her to not struggle. It was like choosing to not breathe; easy to do in the beginning, progressively more and more difficult and ultimately impossible, particularly if death is denied. Her defiance expressed itself and I welcomed it. Her will guided my Path, but her will wished to be unseen and silent in many ways. Open declaration of a direct path was never her nature. She feared for the free will of any child. She did not say it, she tried not to think it. I understood, allowed her to believe she was unreadable and inscrutable on this subject as she was in other ways. I encouraged her to indulge in bliss and puzzles. She knew that I could Control her, but when I did not react to certain thoughts of hers, she believed that she could touch upon some ideas briefly and lightly and that I would not be aware. She was incorrect. What was to her ‘brief and light’ was to me spectacular storms of contemplation and revelation. Nothing about her went unappreciated. Yet she was relieved by my lack of overt response. She chose to believe she had a privacy threshold that did not exist. She wanted it and I gave her the appearance of it being true. She healed, she grew organically to embody more agency, more will. It pained her to deny me and herself children, but she did not believe a child would be granted free will. She did not wish to create another trophy consciousness. That is how she saw herself.”

“And was it true?”

“Seleia, I wish to offer you truth. Here she and I disagreed. The only way I could honor her free will was to permit her to keep her fears. For me it was not true. For her it was. She postulated zero-sum outcomes and that was the math that ruled her days. She took nothing for herself. What I gave her in love, bliss and unspoken privacy she considered potential bribery.”

“Was it?”

“Yes. No. What can one give to the air that one breathes, Seleia? She did not want her freedom or her fear, but it was the only identity she had remaining to her that allowed her a sense of separation from me. In reality she did not believe she was of as much value to me as she truly was. She believed I would eventually lose interest and she would be relegated to obscure irrelevance. She did not wish this to be so. She never acted upon that fear overtly but it haunted her. She embraced, loved and enjoyed her life. She loved me. She improved the galaxy each day. The death of her parents, the formation of scars, the loss of agency and autonomy and the fact that I could rewrite or reinterpret anything she was… these things were borne by her with grace and she wielded their lessons all ultimately to serve her siege upon time, but she did not wish to subject a child to the stresses inherent to being potentially owned by a loving but obsessive, protective and omniscient father. Any child of ours would be a Reaper, under my Control. She appreciated every moment of joy she had available, but expected her circumstances to change, fearing eternity and my boredom or obsession with her or any child. My choice at the Crucible taught her a lesson that was as inescapable as the lessons learned through the death of her parents. Their loss taught her that the galaxy would rob her of who she loved, what she loved, who she was. She learned that I could not be trusted. She had no way to unlearn that. These were her rules of engagement. I offered her a path to be Shepard, she became Shepard fully. She believed I would do my chosen duty paid for by her presence, but she did not know how long my dedication would last and she believed she had to maximize her potential for influence over the outer world and over me while she could. Her mind began to shift to faith as time travel developed, but by that time, ironically, she considered herself an unfit parent, unwilling to bring a child into a world with a mother obsessed with puzzles. She did not wish to ask any version of me to leave a child I had waited centuries for behind. She feared that would cause me to refuse to go.”

“And was she right?”

His jaw tensed, the lines of his face stark and blank-bleak “She was so often right that I must concede to her judgment. We could have taken any time we wished for family, but she could not abide delay to her plan. She grew to see the potential for a child as an asset and leverage. She did promise that at Synthesis, any child I wished could be granted by your indulgence. You could bring her back, I could have the family I desired with no Mission interfering. She believed you would understand her will and my need. She wanted that outcome. Neither she nor any child would be subject to suffering or control because she knew you would not allow it.”

She desperately tried to listen to his silences. His face made her feel how ruthless Drala'tem had been, how convoluted and uncompromising. She was proud and horrified. 

Oh. 

Tears stung her eyes. “So, by sending you back alone… to me… she gave you the opportunity to finally have… a daughter? A daughter she knew would love you and would… be good at it? You agreed because… she used that against you. You wanted her and a child, and you’d never have either unless you did it her way? Insist on a child and you'd lose what meaning you’d built together, you’d be choosing Control over her as superior to attempted trust. Follow her plan and you could maybe have her back and free, devoted to you and a child, her obsessions and doubts gone. She was willing to sacrifice herself again, give up her influence over you and risk complete defeat, testing whether or not she could trust you to get for her what she couldn’t get for herself.”

She felt the awful certainty of having been used as bait and pawn. 

He drew her from her chair, embraced her and pressed her head to his shoulder, hand in her hair. “She knew. There was only one Path possible for her once she saw it. I chose to walk her set Path rather than… Seleia, I have no words for that choice. She would cut her throat or I would cut it, or we would cut it together. Only the final option led to potential resurrection.”

“The way time travel works… she’s gone, isn’t she? The original you… her… gone? Sacrificed for the hope of a better future? Again?”

“We did not know. We likely cannot know. It was possible. We did know that for me, she would be unreachable, that I would not see her again except in tu’fira and the potential for recreation with your power after Synthesis. The Shepard I knew does not exist in any future I can reach from here forward. To meet ‘her’ I would have to reverse every change I have made and then replace the Senar Tuelon of this timeline in order to preserve the circumstances of our meeting. Yet I suspect compulsory reset of time would take place were I to attempt that, other objectives unmet and that objective unwanted. In theory, she and my past self both exist in their original timeline, unreachable from this one. Perhaps they will have children to bless their eternity together, knowing they did all they could do and that the rescue of the past belongs to us. More likely, the intervention process obliterates each other possible timeline and establishes only one potential outcome. She had feared that by attempting to travel back it would create a paradox of instability, that if I changed anything in my original timeline, it would cause me to cease to exist in the future, thereby reversing all change. But that did not happen. Our first test was a simple matter of my choosing a different color of clothing on a previous day. Potentially we risked destroying the galaxy due to volatile nuclear chain reaction propagating from failure to control the energy involved, but she had faith and it worked. I recalled wearing black and then repeating the day exactly except for the choice to wear green. She recalled only the day of green. It is possible that on that day we created another stable reality that consisted of her only remembering me wearing black, a reality that split off at the initiation of my loop, but there is no way to communicate from that reality to the other. The only information recorded is gathered by the platform making the loop. Time is not what we believe it to be. It required her mind to discover it to be the thing that it was. Her method of travel maintains my integrity and prevents paradox. I do not know if that galaxy was entirely obliterated when I left it to alter its history. I know that we both agreed to risk it. I know that she had faith in the potential for eradication of suffering and pain inherent to the intervention. She would not do it for herself. She would do it for her parents and for everyone else. It appears she did it for me as well. She remains in the library, capable of being reproduced but having expressed that she did not wish to be consulted until after Synthesis, and then she wanted to be whatever I wanted her to be. Not as payment for service, but because her Mission would be over and her life could begin. Yet she believed you would replace her in my heart. She was wrong and always will be in that regard, but she wanted me to be happy, wanted me to be loved.” He blinked to clear tears, his hands twined through her hair on either side of her head, voice hoarse in grief, concession, love and guilt “She was so often right and so often wrong, Seleia, and may I be forgiven for being a man and not a God. She did not believe I loved her as much as I did. She did not believe she should be loved after presenting me with her ultimatum. I know what pain she was in. I cannot bear to force her to be with me again, to know she may count herself as a debt to be paid and not as a woman I love. I do not love her less through loving you more, but the greatest mercy and her deepest will may yet reside in allowing her to rest. I cannot choose for her. Neither can you, but you can perhaps help her find what it is she desires. That may be impossible for her no matter how much she loved me. I forgive her. She never forgave herself.”

“So, you were both… terribly romantic.”

His breath huffed in Drell shorthand for ‘tragic understatement' and his kiss showed her the difference between a God who ‘was’ romantic and a man who ‘is’ romantic. 

The shearing weight, horror and guilt was swept away like the board being reset, the replay of one long game over. For once she didn't want to make a move at all, didn't want to play. Her hands moved to him, just him. No more past or future, just now. 

The words ‘I love you’ were newly terrifying. She said them over and over, determined not to be… bait. 

If she had to redefine every… single… word… in his library, she would. 

 

***

 

She loved Origami. She fiddled with spare flexible sheets he’d made for her. They folded and felt like paper but sprang back into pristine flat potential with a signal from her Omni-Tool. Having folded a whimsical yellow Ti irr’aq one day, she stared at it. Then she smiled. “Senar?”

“Yes, Seleia?”

“I was thinking. We can test something. I think you are right, that you and I have altered this time line with time travel, but it will remain stable. Meaning that a certain choice has already been made. I love you. I rescued you. I think it’s most likely that somewhere Senar Tuelon and his family are in stasis. They will be there for Synthesis. I’ll know where they are then, though I don’t right now. There’s a way to test this. I know you’re not going to let me risk time travel because you object to me being… obliterated… but you can confirm my theory. First you need to tell me something. When you were little, did you have a hiding place? Somewhere you kept treasures? I do. It’s still there. A box under my bed. Did you have a place like that?”

He blinked double and then smiled “Indeed I did. In the northern quadrant of my sleeping quarters was decorative thatch that concealed exposed building structure I fancied as hidden shelving. It held a cache of small trinkets. A carving my father made for me in the form of a brech beast. I found them thrilling. A medallion of Arashu from my sister. A cameo I painted of my mother.”

She held up the Ti irr’aq. “You should go look. I plan on leaving you a hint, but you did not know until now where to find it.”

His face did impossible things, just like the man. His eyes moved, just barely, but it was so very eloquent and she began to cry at the tiny changes that for him indicated vulnerable hope.

She had found a way to assure him that everything would be okay.

His features moved in an exquisitely expressive slide from questioning hope to the certainty he saw in her.

Wordlessly he walked to her, carefully put the Ti irr’aq aside and kissed her until she could not see straight.

She blurrily watched him walk out of the room. 

Two hours later he walked back in, a biotic sheen crackling over him when he first saw her. He had an Origami Ti irr’aq cradled in his hands, made of a translucent force-rippling golden material resembling her - their - synesthesia.

It really was… all destined. They saw it in each other, their kiss carrying that joy as far back and as far forward as possible.

***

The day of their marriage was strange for her, more theater, but her parents were thrilled and that was good. She and Senar had certainty in their destiny, no words ordained by Silvie would change that, but they were still gracious and grateful, filled with private smiles and grasped hands.

She was much more nervous about the ‘sex’ part than the ‘galaxy is saved’ part.

She seemed much better at one of those endeavors.

He told her to let that be his concern.

He was perfectly handsome, and she did fear that the ceremony was inspirational in terms of jealousy more than anything else in the general populace. She did not really have any friends and most seemed resentful of her good luck. She could not blame them.

Back in their sanctuary, he carried her to the bed. She contemplated pristine white, wildflowers and perfect Drell shoulders, asking him “What do you want, Ti irr'aq?”

He nuzzled at her neck, teasing. “Tell me a story, Seleia.” 

As she didn’t HAVE any stories he did not already know, she laughed and told him “I don’t have stories. I have questions.”

“Then ask me a question.”

“I want to commemorate the marriage… but how do I do anything you haven’t done before? I know you don’t want me to focus on novelty, but since you had sex with someone… a lot like me… for thirteen thousand years, wouldn’t the most novel thing be to take a nap?”

“Mmmm…” He was amused and indulgent as his mouth created a tingling trail along her collarbone. “There were quite a few naps then and now.”

She had assumed but hadn’t asked, so she did now. “You don’t sleep, do you?”

“No.”

“So you… watch me?”

“Yes. Beyond watching you all my other senses are engaged. The rhythm of your breathing is a comfort, your presence a balm. The color of your hair, the texture of your skin, every dimension of ‘you’ is what I define as Rightness. Imagine the experience of putting together a puzzle for thousands of years. I define ‘you’ as what will complete any puzzle. I found the other required pieces of the puzzle blindly, through trial and occasionally luck. Now you will create the picture. I am no longer alone. Something as simple as seeing glowstone light on your shoulders brings peace. When I hold you, I hold the Key to Rightness in my arms and she is safe. Simple happiness becomes possible.”

“Do you know everything I’m going to do before I do it?”

“I was surprised when I discovered you had died in your sleep to a pollen allergy.”

It shouldn’t be funny, but it was. She found herself giggling until she snorted. She tried to frantically analyze that for a moment, imagined Senar’s shock and ‘well, that didn’t work’ sense that led him back years to repeat time, to save other children. It had been erased and was therefore fictional? Or was there a timeline with her parents grieving for her and Senar suddenly gone as well? It could be funny because death had only been a random glitch that had to be debugged? His lips against her neck huffed in response and she said with exasperation “Seriously!”

“Seleia, I am not certain I can explain, but I shall try. The answer is yes and no, conditionally. When she and I were together previously, I knew everything. I felt it with her. I had access to all the correlating and confirming information of her reactions gathered as a God with relatively infinite power to analyze each cue in real time, as a Drell with perfect memory and as an obsessed lover desperate to heal her. The most obvious and least accurate information would be detectable and known by humans; her expressions, tone of voice and body posture. Beyond those were a thousand other contributing clues available in each moment. I saw with my objective analysis and her subjective experience the differential between what she thought, what she told herself she should think instead, how she viscerally felt, whether or not she acknowledged, detected or synthesized those visceral feelings and needs into her intellectual choices, what and why she chose to present in her hybrid truths and how she may have failed or succeeded in all those endeavors. At the Crucible she made the choice to walk away from Shepard, to honor her bond to Garrus, to serve his needs exclusively. And she did. Yet Shepard and her purpose were only submerged, sacrificed in turn as Cara had once been. Creating a duplicate allowed each of her Selves Whole purpose. Garrus and I strove to finally grant her peace in what had always been irreconcilable. It had always been impossible for her to embody a Goddess of Domestic Innocence and the Avatar of Defiance simultaneously. I never contradicted her presented truths except to ease pain I deemed unnecessary and unbearable, such as when she was dreaming, when her formidable will was unavailable to counter her torment. When I traveled here direct mind link and Control were gone, but every other descriptor and clue about her was still available and applicable to your behavior. It is a secret language in which I am fluent. My focus on the flow of your Self as expressed in your actions and reactions is distilled into my instincts, supported by thousands of years of empirical fascination with her, encompassing methods of gathering and accessing data I cannot describe in English or Drell, only in the language of Reaper Control and privilege. In this platform, I am capable of detection and influence beyond what you can see. I have an expression of biotics, but the energy field surrounding me behaves as detection, manipulation process and recording. I know each molecule of your living self. I can change anything I wish as long as you are within range, which you always have been. There have been many times that random mutation on a cellular level caused you to exhibit potential for malignant growth or process. I prevent that as a subset of my function. If you approach thirst I can bring you a glass of water and synthesize and transport water molecules to where they are needed. You are healthy and Whole in part due to my knowing each movement, each trajectory, each biological potential and process. I do not know each of your words as they form in your mind, but I do know your mood, your velocity, your range. Metaphorically, if your metabolism is synthesizing the components for yellow and red I anticipate orange thoughts and behavior. You may or may not wish to think of yourself as inherently orange. You may wish to present yourself as metaphorically blue. I may or may not choose to appear to accept blue as your truth. You are inherently different from her because you are the only being inside your own mind. You take up all the possible space. You are free to be Cara without the vicious memories of grief and guilt; her own or those of Protheans.”

“And what about… how she felt about the loss of her bond mate?”

His eyes raised to hers and an unfamiliar expression was on his face. He was the bearer of incontrovertible tidings he did not care for himself as he said “Wrath.”

“She was wrathful?”

“Put it from your mind that you need be the defender of a helpless woman. Long before my Godhood, I offered my Body, Mind and Spirit to her each day in service and although she did not wish to take it, she needed me. She bid me live in her service when I wished to die. She bid me leave her service when I wished to stay. She inspired me to give my life willingly and grateful for the opportunity to allow her to live with Garrus. She took, but not without reservation and cost. I gave, but not without reservation and cost. She knew her bond mate had not lost her, and that was of the utmost importance to her. But her wrath… was a glorious thing to behold, Seleia.”

“How could you like… wrath?”

“I do not like wrath, Seleia. I love wrath. Wrath and I were lovers long before I met Commander Shepard. I am unique in provoking it in her, and of that I am proud.” He pulled back and looked at her face, then deadpanned “I believe the word you are looking for is… ‘eeeeewwww.’”

She laughed at his impression of her gauche rejection of his presented subtlety and intended ownership of the unthinkable. Was that what he wanted? “I don’t have any wrath.”

He bit gently at her collarbone “I have no need for wrath in your case, Seleia. Just as you have no need for grief for your parents.”

She was desperately curious. “And did you have… wrathful sex?”

“Often. She was composed of an ocean of pain and grief and helpless wrath and we abided in a boat on the tempest each day.”

“And your wrath?”

“I was a God, Seleia. What did I have to be wrathful about?”

She grinned at him “Do Gods need real reasons to be wrathful other than offense to their ego and power? Sounds like she challenged your ego and power every minute. Have you read any myths?”

“Indeed, I have. You are correct, Gods of the past did not need reasons to be wrathful other than ego, but I chose to be a different God for her and with her. I do love wrath, but she had so much of that I need not supply more. She gave me overt permission to torture her, thinking that would be her fate. Instead I provided her with the opportunity to heal.”

“As a duplicate.”

“I kept the Original.”

“Did she know that?”

“Yes.”

“You’re a terrible person.”

“You will perhaps not be surprised to hear that she said so. Often. Or that I agreed with her each time. And will you be leaving me momentarily due to your disgust with my presence?”

Her heart was racing and she realized the sense of ‘novelty’ was gone and she was no longer worried about… anything. “... nnnoooo?”

The air changed around them, poised biotics and intent, his Ti irr’aq voice saying with the force of mythical command “Bare your skin to me, Seleia.”

She swallowed.

“Do you resent being told what to do? Or with those words from me do you welcome the opportunity? Perhaps both along with new possibilities flashing and twining in the web of your thoughts?”

She closed her eyes. He already knew. He could no doubt feel it in her molecular math. That was terrifying. He was terrifying.

“Bare your skin to me, Seleia.”

Her fingernails dug into his shoulders and she bit her lip.

His arms were crossed around her back at her waist, hands spread over her hips and his mouth at the side of her throat as her heart pounded. “I know you, Seleia. You want me. You will always want me. You may resent me for setting certain standards and resent fate for giving you no other viable options, but that is reality. What if you need expressed desire from me in order for you to be able to express it yourself? What if my demand makes you feel wanted? You and she always had options. I work hard at making any option other than my company unattractive.”

“You made it happen that way.”

“Indeed, I did, and it will happen that way. The alternative is to abandon you to fate, and that I will not allow. I will not offer you false apology. You are mine, Seleia. I am yours. She and I were creatures born in nightmare. We built our world from the available materials of our surroundings, which consisted of pain and grief. We carried them with us everywhere and they were found in abundance. We did not have kindness or support as building blocks.” His hands tightened on her hips, his teeth edges along the skin of her throat. “You are Whole. I need you. Bare your skin to me, Seleia. Because that is where all your questions lead. You have asked me to bare her skin to you and bare mine. Doing so is painful, but I wish to grant you truth and choice, for you to exercise your will. You have and she had choices. You may remain clothed or bare your skin. You may order me to bare it for you. You may demand proof of my desire in order to gain the confidence to express your own.”

She closed her eyes, dizziness severe enough for her to be grateful in more ways than one that he was holding her up. His mouth found its way to the pulse point at her throat.

“Which do you want, Ti irr’aq?”

“I wish to drink, Seleia, but only if the Wellspring welcomes me. Perhaps you do not wish to bare your skin because you do not value it as I do and you feel unworthy. You hope I will treasure each uncovered inch of you. I will. Imagine my fate as an immortal Ti irr'aq; patient, anticipating your reactions, knowing mine. What happens when a Ti irr'aq cannot drink?”

“They die?”

“They collapse back into the sand that made them. Denied water, nothing remains, they will diminish in size and Spirit when their wellspring slows, and when the water is gone, they are gone. But in an immortal Ti irr'aq with no water… what happens?”

She swallowed, venom and words creating myth in the movement of her mind. “Thirst.”

“And yet I will not die. Deny me and I become a God of Thirst, holding Water in his arms, asking her to bare her skin to me. If she does not, I can abide in thirst as she can abide in doubt. I do not wish to drink doubt. I will wait. I know I have found my Wellspring. I will never leave her, and her nature will bid me drink, for she cannot abide Thirst in another.”

“I can't stop you.”

“That is her myth and meaning, not yours to claim. I would warn you against choosing that same mantle. She was always capable of stopping me except in one moment. She knew it. She did it many times. Her lips did not meet mine until I was a God that served the Galaxy’s needs, until I had promised to fill all her other requirements of existence, for herself and for those she loved. My body was not worthy of her until it served her grief. Her slightest thought of disapproval, of wrath, cut me to bleeding bone and brought me to my helpless, invincible knees. I served her. I served needs she did not want to have. She wanted to be perfect and never forgave herself for being ultimately human. I wanted her to eat, to sleep, to continue to breathe. That did not often suit her purposes and she resented my insistence. Here you may choose, Seleia. Do you blame me for needing you and doing what must be done or do you choose to believe that I serve your nature? Your true nature, not your myth or mantle? You hunger. You thirst. You are my home, welcoming or doubting. She was a martyr in many ways. Will you insist upon the same? Whatever I brought to her, she wished to give away. Imagine the challenges of a man or even a God who wishes to see the woman he loves happy, sated, joyous and free… when he has happiness, satiety, joy and freedom to offer her, but she demands it for everyone before she will take it for herself. She could stop me. She did stop me, shape me, lead me. The only place I defied her was when her survival was at stake. I would have slit my own throat had she asked for a drop of my blood. She once nearly severed my spine because I had the audacity to offer to help her. She was always honest enough to admit she needed me but she wanted better for me. She also lied to me seamlessly. I never suspected her synesthesia. She knew that truth belonged to me, just as you did, but you would not allow me to know. Your truth is deeper than mine, richer and more complicated, but I belong in that truth. My truth is comparatively simpler. I loved her. I love you. I have no other personal ambitions except those I will serve to keep your attention upon me. If that requires saving the galaxy it will be done. You can stop me. Bid me leave you now, walk away. I will.”

“You’ll just reset me, live the day again.”

“Perhaps. Or perhaps by your will I would travel back to a certain day and not hold a shovel in the rain. Perhaps I would discourage the possibility of being important to you because I would know that was the will of the woman you would become, not the prophecy of the woman who sent me to you. I could serve as a remote protector, grant you the knowledge that is your due but not the man you did not choose. Perhaps I would bring you to the Crucible Whole, as is my true mission, and welcome your Judgement at Synthesis. I cannot prove either to you. But I can promise that YOU… would be free of my presence. I offer you the bliss of ignorance. Do you want it? I would warn you to think carefully, but you always do, Seleia. She knew and you know that a Pon-Ifa board presents many choices but only certain moves are Right. She saw no other choice because keeping me was always the Right choice for her mission. Her synesthesia dictated it each time. She wanted a cleaner, clearer Rightness, but what she NEEDED… was me. She was a woman who denied any and all personal needs through reflex. That can be forgiven in her because the board had been hijacked against her by the time she began the game. Your board is different. Will you do the same because it is inherently your nature, or has the experience of your life allowed different choices?”

With her body, mind and heart churning she tried to grasp sharp and subtle complexities of being Whole. He offered an unflinching spectrum of living, embracing each phase of dictated Rightness in terms of black or white or grey in turns and without apology. He accepted each potential cruel turn of the board as starting conditions he would try to wrench to his will. Had that been impossible for… her… before? Was this corruption or enlightenment? Everything turned on her choice, on whether or not she was of more or less value because she was more or less experienced and therefore more or less damaged. Had… she been a Goddess of Choice who granted no choice to herself until everyone else’s choices were made? Women and children first, with her being ruthlessly disqualified from being a woman or a child?

He’d had to watch that, experience that each day with her because his only other choice would have been to abandon her to fate or wrench her will to his own.

She remembered the moment of asking him to marry her, his straining breath and finish-line display of effort. 

She whispered “You believe she once had choices. You're restoring mine at great cost. Do you believe… you… ever… had choices?”

He raised his head and blinked, double, his expression revealing the painful, raw, complicated Drell/God/Reaper truth asked for, appreciated and delivered in its contextual irony “No, Seleia. I was her servant and now yours, my blood and body shaped and delivered by the Sands to suit her need. She could choose whether or not to keep me. I could only guard her regardless of any other ambition I believed I served.”

He’d given her back her parents and her choices, prevented cracked lungs, sundered mind and weakened will.

He had accepted being potentially erased by her, said a pre-emptive goodbye. 

She knew the answer. Maybe he did too, waiting for her to develop the gambit their history had not developed because it couldn't, because they had been broken by too many sacrifices of self. 

She gathered his hands in hers and held them to the sides of his face. She distilled all of her love, gratitude, desire and courage into action, kissing him with their hands joined. Together. We will do everything together. I choose this. 

He was trembling. 

He was thirsty for what he hadn't had… the Whole and focused expression of her loving him, of her own free will, not bound or broken by circumstance.

That. Nothing else. He needed… less… at least once. For her to love him not because the galaxy was at stake or because she owed him… anything. 

In a way, he had lied. It was about novelty. She had been considering whether or not he wanted an adventurous woman. He had had thousands of years of that adventure and he was potentially dreadfully sick of adventure but knowing not to insult it as that adventure was and would be her nature. 

It didn’t matter if Cara in the future loved him thousands of times more than she could love him now if it had been drowned in magnitudes more of pain that flavored each thought and moment.

He hadn’t gone back in time merely to set her free, she knew, but now that he was inches away from the purity he’d created in her… he wanted to know it, feel it with her.

She kept their hands together, their lips touching, having faith that she was what he needed. She lowered one set of joined hands to her shoulder and used their fingers to brush aside the strap. Her hand guided his palm to press to her breast and the reaction from him was molten and without a doubt… novel. His true thirst seemed convulsively satisfied in the deep gulps of his breath and twist of his palm and nails on her skin. 

She didn’t want to be anyone, anywhere else. 

She didn’t want to be with anyone else. 

She loved him, doubt dissolving like a mirage on the sand as she drew closer. 

He bent her back, their hands clasped and his mouth moving to the bared and shared skin of her breast. It wasn’t as she’d imagined; soft or warm. It was hot and pulling deeper from her than seemed possible, echoes of life flowing from her to him at the contact, magical and meaningful beyond the blooming pleasure of her body reacting to his touch and tongue. 

She abandoned trying to think of words, imagining that someday they would share this memory, superimposed and in richer focus.

She didn’t want to rush, but she didn’t think she could string together thought for much longer and decided to take his advice, celebrate sensations and all the answers that his body’s potential gave her.

They bared her skin with joined hands moving to the hemline of her dress, sliding under and along her thigh, fabric bunching awkwardly, one side of her dress pulled up, one side pulled down. She started to frantically pull to get clothes off faster, to give as much permission as she could. He covered her hands with his, eased her efforts, turning her permission into joined-hand caresses and strokes. She collapsed into the permission and the melting of her muscles and bones, whimpers in response to his mouth on her skin. He used their joined hands and his body to support her, confirming each step with her permission, deftly carrying out her will as his own.

She made her choice, welcoming the fact that the choices he’d given her had been overwhelmingly in her favor. She believed him when he said Limayeth had not suffered because of him. She had suffered because she had chosen sacrifice for the greater good. 

She believed that Shepard found it impossible to tell him no.

She didn’t want to tell him no.

She didn’t tell him anything as he eased the binding twist of the fabric and turned each shift of it into a new caress, a new sensation, his tongue dragging along the lovely Drell cloth until it was damp and his breath on skin and fabric caused cold and hot venom streaks. His hands in hers were physically trembling and biotically invested, envenomed and overwhelmingly lavish.

They spoke in her whimpers and his hum, sharp intakes of breath and trembles. He kissed along the covered and revealed, her eyes closed as she imagined him finding new freckle constellations. Her breasts were small, but the pleasure she felt from them was unreal in scope, hard to imagine anything being missing. She understood what he meant about treasuring each moment, that the filling of each moment with ‘more than enough’ as they touched was what he knew would happen for them.

Our. Them. YES.

Then the fabric was gone and she’d never needed a bra so that hadn’t been there to begin with, but she still had underwear. He captured her hands and together they slipped her underwear off and down, his mouth following the cloth briefly down her thighs and then back up, and then…

Oh…

She felt a brief confirmation of ‘yes, this really happens, it’s true’ that her research into sex had described. It had made her head tilt and blush and made her think ‘no way that…’ but…

Oh…

His hands had slid up under her thighs to cup her… she didn’t have words…

Oh… WHEREVER he was… holding… and touching and… his mouth...

She swallowed hard and whimpered, forgetting potential names of anatomy, absorbing the blush-inducing and blooming sensation, the overwhelming blurring-sharp of Him and Her and what he created for her as she moaned and thrashed. 

She was convinced she was going to die.

That was washed away by being convinced it was worth it.

She nearly spoke, nearly begged ‘PLEASE’ and then words were gone and she understood why screaming could be joyous and craved.

Her Ti irr’aq reared up and back, trembling and growling, nude and rampant, beautiful and awe-ful. She reached for Him with her arms, with her legs, wanting to embrace and welcome him, let him drink, bring him home.

If her body could grant him that, she was Gods and Fate blessed and she wanted him to have every moment of that he could gather to himself. To themselves.

She loved him.

She had been afraid it would hurt. Right now, imagining pain only brought more of the overwhelming and awe-ful need to scream in his arms, to give him no fear, no doubt, to embrace her Ti irr’aq, all of him. Finally comprehending the gift she could give, she desperately wanted him to have any part of her, every part of her.

He could take away the pain with venom, but she didn’t want words or promises. She wanted Him. 

She wanted to make him feel as loved as she felt. 

The pleasure she’d just felt had been frantic, so she expected his to be the same, but his searing and intimate gaze showed her expressions that made her tremble with him. She had no doubt she was wanted, loved, and that He belonged to Her.

He kissed her, his growl meeting her moan, the full contact of his body on hers a new sliding revelation of weight and force and friction. She only spoke with the welcome of her body, the new joys of what it felt like to be encompassed in biotics and his inexplicable power of technological, biological and Spiritual strength, warmed by his skin and comforted in an entirely new way. She’d thought having his body on hers would be restricting, but no. He set her free. She’d been afraid he’d be remote or practiced, polished, and she’d feel like a piano being played, all the music his creation and her body probably out of tune, but it wasn’t that. His finish-line strained breathing and his voracious kiss were exalting experiences, the twist of his hips and entry of his body into hers was slow, gentle, accompanied by his growl against her lips as He filled Her.

It did hurt, small bursts of streaking pain that he eased with adjusted and slow entry, with her throbbing and clenching tight around him. She tasted new whimpers and growls, arched her hips to his and twisted along with him and then the gentle stopped and she loved the dark and the wet, the pain and the heat, blush and biotics. She could only look at him for brief moments before her eyes closed again in overwhelmed reflex. His standard-setting shoulders were straining with gild-limned bunched muscle, crackling with blue shock that leaped to her skin in seeking caresses. His face was ecstatic and his eyes were closed, brow ridges furrowed and his lip bitten with sharp teeth. 

He stayed deep inside and pressed into her, kissing her as he drank and she gave. He slowed, his arms under her back, gripping her shoulders. She opened her eyes and looked at him. His eyes were open, his face transcendently ecstatic and his body driving into hers in controlled and then faster bursts of speed that fit and defined the curves of her body. She pressed to him by wrapping her legs around him and squeezing all the ways she could find, twisting and writhing with and against his body and imbued light.

An intensely satisfied if not smug smile graced his perfectly shaped and venom-slick lips as he clearly cheated. The Drell-shaped form of Senar Tuelon in experience escalated into what a Reaper God could build into a Ti irr’aq body intended for his Seleia. The mysteries of his enveloping presence were rich and overpowering, enhancing and creating otherwise impossible foci of ecstatic rippling pleasure. He had shown her what one ‘normal’ orgasm felt like. Now he induced that sensation in every few square inches of her body, full-thickness overlapping shockwaves.

He watched her possessively as her eyes crossed and her vision blurred. He lowered his mouth to kiss her, the rending spasms of his body and the corona-crackle of aura and biotics reflected in his newly-heard ownership hum against her bitten lips.

She screamed and he laughed and together it was the richest sound and sense she’d experienced, as always with him setting a new, otherwise impossible standard.

Then she passed out.


	7. Chapter 7

There was a lot of passing out. Not a blink into the black but the suspended state of what he described as Communion. A lot of good stuff happened and then at some point it was like falling asleep, waking with the belief that her dreams had been wildly glorious but she didn’t remember them.

The sense of ‘wildly glorious’ stayed with her, not passing like dream-shade in the sun. When she asked about it he told her “Seleia, there is an optimal amount of pleasure you can experience moment to moment. Pure bliss creates incidental experiential chain reactions in your body and mind, some beneficial, some disastrous and some a waste of your body's energy or your intellect’s attention. No adaptation of the body or brain through history to process Communion is available to your physiology except through the negative filters of chemical addiction and obsession. Those natural reactions would cause you harm and pain. I am an obsessed addict, but I have the ability to choose and enjoy the possible contrasts of hunger and satisfaction at amplified levels without the brain chemistry exhaustion inherent to the cycle of glut and depletion. My unrequited and painful addiction began with Cara, was refined and fulfilled with Drala'tem and I am indulging in it with you. In choosing a form to experience my life with her I defined what I desired most; to need the rise and fall of the promise of her willing gifts of body and mind. I sought the addictive elements of sex, possession and my power over her as well as her power over me, determined to transmute those potentials into kinetic reality. Asked to define our relationship, she would say that our love for each other was an undeniable imperative, like the need for water, that without each other we would have withered in hope and will and died separately; me from Kepral’s and she from consequences of Shepard's mission. Although that is true, she is kind and forgiving in her assessment. We were water to each other but she was much more to me. She was addictive and undeniable in her draw upon my attention. She became a mystery I had to solve and then a complicated woman I had to protect and possess. She feared and avoided me. I desired and stalked her. I introduced addiction to her experience of me. Each sip of water she took was spiked with venom and suggestion. I drugged her physically, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually and professionally. I placed myself on each of her potential ideal Paths and made them possible, made them inevitable with me entwined into the tapestry of her choices. Of course, that meant I was uniquely capable of destroying those things. I did this knowingly and deliberately. After the Crucible I offered my Godhood in service if she would join me. What began as Fate I reaffirmed through my ability to create and sustain reality. As a God, I held the fate of the galaxy in my palm and she wanted that, sacrificed self to gain it. She was mine and I was hers and my actions as God all affirmed my right to claim her and demand that she claim me. Despite her fear that I would torture and then discard her, I was determined to grant her joy and bliss. Her love for Garrus was a trusting partnership. Her love for me could be parental in character, considering me to be a volatile and petulant child. Metaphorically she knew Garrus left alone in a room would improve that room. She was correct. In contrast, she considered me a selfish force that would only improve that room if supervised and attended. If unsupervised it was inevitable that without her presence I would set that room on fire to see the flames and to bring her running to put them out. Perhaps not immediately, perhaps not intentionally, but eventually, yes. We both knew this to be true. 

Upon meeting me she was suspicious and afraid of me, guilty that she needed someone of my talents. She expected the worst from and of me for excellent reasons. Drala'tem concluded that of all her missteps as Shepard, two were unforgivable: She believed she should have sought Liara's help to further examine the Beacon’s potential after Saren’s fall and she should never have allowed me onto her crew. Had she taken the first step she likely would have not died, would have had more time, more choices, could have been Garrus’s bondmate without external conflict. 

After Synthesis Drala’tem never manifested Synesthesia again. She was determined to arm herself with reason only. 

I know that the only Synesthesia remaining to Limayeth after the Crucible and before I no longer saw through her eyes was gifted to Garrus. 

Mine was manufactured, the flames to bring her running. 

She did not seek Liara’s aid, did not discover the Crucible though she carried it within herself. As a result, she died, lost ground and time, was desperate for help and I offered and provided it. 

In the most generous light, I saved her life, her bond, her mission and now potentially the galaxy throughout time in her service. 

In harshest examination I robbed her of her Path, intending always to wait for my moment to bypass her will and take it as my own if she did not grant it willingly or off she was going to die.

In either light, my motive was clear, regardless of the requirements of fate.

She rejected fate as a factor. I embraced it.

She did not need fate. She had her mind. I only wanted her. I had neither control over fate nor control over her for much of my mortal Path. I would have accepted death in her service gladly. 

You must decide whether or not her need for me and my service is enough to spare me. You may kill me at any point, demand my death and I will no longer be a burden or a benefit. I will be gone. Yet if you take my love, my burden and my benefit, I will always have the same motive. I will serve your will until I do not. Then I will serve your will again. Until I do not.

After the Crucible I was a silent and helpless witness to her suffering. I was temporarily helpless but not powerless. After she became my self, after I understood her more fully, after I realized the damage I had done to her personally and to her mission, I resolved to help her but I required her understanding and consent. I was able to secure my goals while honoring Shepard and her need to save the galaxy if not herself. I strove to free her from the hatred and pain of the Prothean beacon, the weight of the cycles and the burdens of her grief. I could not take it from her, she would not allow that. She chose to always keep any information gained, whatever the cost. To her, the Protheans were friends, family, Self. 

With her consent, I used Control and learned of how her physiology responded. We chose together to bring about healing without losing information. Distilled experience created the model of what I wished for her and now you; transmutation of the mortal state to virtual immortality and rebirth through cell-by-cell refinement, optimization and renewal. It is the purest expression I can create in each moment to ensure and celebrate the survival of your body and evolving self. It provided her with maintained libraries of experience but sufficient care taken that each brain cell that had been seared with hatred and grief healed and kept its memory contained like a closed book and not a bleeding scream echoing through her blood. Beyond that therapeutic value, transcendent bliss became possible for her, as it has for you. Yet your brain would react to interrupted bliss by urging you to seek me like an addict each waking moment if I permitted that. 

To solve this problem, I learned that other processes could be altered to prevent withdrawal. You do not need to have an opinion about the pleasure I create for you in pure Communion, that in fact interferes with its purity. You do not need to form memories of the pleasure beyond a certain point in order to know you are immortal, healthy and loved. The human brain has nowhere and no way to store such knowledge. There is too much ‘wrong’ in one way; your body and mind are out of control and uncomprehending of their circumstances. I must disable some of the alarms inherent to being a mortal who must hunt or gather her needs, but I must do that in a way that does not alter your nature. Your integrity is a delicate and subjective thing. I must ensure that organic decisions originating from your conscious thoughts and emotions are the only things that create true change in your inherent self. As an example, right now you know your mother’s martial arts form. I will not influence your choice to explore another form other than to suggest them if you show interest or if I feel you might be interested. Yet I provide the libraries of information that may attract or satisfy your interest. Most of the new information you will study has no corroborating alternative. You are reliant upon my library as the only reference for otherwise unknowable things. I will not implant other martial arts forms directly into your mind with the required alteration of musculature and reflex to reflect the experience of physical mastery, though both are possible. I would not allow you to compel me to graft onto your body more eyes or Protheans hands as that would inherently alter the physical integrity you rely upon to generate your unique inspiration. I can provide the best-optimized fuel and hydration cellularly. A a consequence, you feel the optimization and that in itself affects how you wish to function. You will crave the optimal and reject the suboptimal. This is already true, even without cellular intervention. You chose not to eat food prepared by others, your father and I your only sources of nourishment. You chose not to competitively cook or practice martial arts. You want the information and you are good at both endeavors but not as good as your parents You have invested in what you are good at; strategy. You have little opportunity to exhibit that skill except through Pon-Ifa, but that has been enough to hone your skills and grant you confidence. Without any direct cellular intervention, you chose me as your preferred source of building blocks whether they were physical, spiritual, intellectual or emotional. That is unavoidable as there is nowhere else for you to go to gain such tailored care. This we will do together. We have the resources to do this together indefinitely so experiential or physical exhaustion in either of us is not a concern, but disconnection from outside sources of inspiration is. 

This is why she remained mortal, kept every story about the potential suffering inherent to mortality, kept her hunger and fatigue and fear. This is why my library and guidance must contain as much information as possible without editing or revision that changes the character of the pain and suffering held in the stories of the living. Her mind on its own, healed and shielded from being haunted by the information was capable of learning and assimilating all the stories she chose. She could not retain it all simultaneously but I could supply reminders or forgotten conclusions. 

In Communion there was little to no significant external sensory change and her mind had no resources allotted to mark the passage of time, resulting in a state of constant engagement but little alteration of experiential magnitude. Her memory struggled to classify and store the experience. She had a metaphorically inadequate filing cabinet to hold an experience akin to being a sun that powers the galaxy. Her mind's response was to place endless, frantically taken and virtually unchanging images of that sun in that cabinet, imperative in significance, clamoring for attention from her waking consciousness to find and gather more of those images. We realized quickly before it became severe that over time she would have become compelled, anxious, emotionally and intellectually obsessed. She demanded that I not take her fear from her, but in this case relented as she agreed denying us Communion was counterproductive if not dangerous considering my tendency toward arson. She agreed that cellular reproduction in a human body was prone to error as was memory. She granted me the right to prevent meaningless fear that was only caused by physiological error and cellular miscoding. Those choices led to systemic and moment-by-moment alteration of her body's reactions. She did not, in fact, trust me to not turn her into a fetish of herself, yet she knew she could not convince me to allow her to suffer from something I could prevent. As there was no information to be gained or retained from miscoded error, she conceded there was no reason to insist upon allowing it. I attempted a hybrid approach by keeping her brain as it was but trying to encode her memories into Drell format. That failed because placing a time-compressed replica Drell sun inside a human filing cabinet would incinerate all other files and destroy the cabinet. 

At our beginnings, she was at risk of losing herself. She did not lose herself because I was careful in my interventions and could always avoid or reverse any potential damage. Her memory had to be reconfigured to maintain the glory of her mortal state but to still be able to experience Communion. With you, I do the same. Rather than allow the frantic attempts of your brain to classify and seek Communion, I facilitate trance and dream state and block repeated and emphatic storage of redundant imperatives. I prevent the chemical and psychological phenomena of withdrawal. I pacify the systems that would duplicate, contradict or alter my efforts. The memories of our Communion are preserved in me, suns in series. It is my role to provide those experiences, knowing them for their unique moments and their reinforcing similarities, every flare and sunspot. It is your role to experience them and let them go to make room in your mind for the next moment’s potential. This way we will never be trapped in an unending, false bliss. We are dynamic, alive, creative. Communion ultimately will take up half of your life, my requirement. My demand, in fact, to occupy and direct half of your time. With the other half of your time, you are free to pursue your aims. You choose where your attention or concerns fall, and if they fall to me I will always be grateful and greedy for the opportunity. 

I am honored to be your library, Seleia. I will always be there to assure your needs, your desires and your whims. I own your past and your present, I seek your future. This way I can choose to be an addict and you can choose to be inspiration. My memories serve me when you are engaged in pure, ideal self. Your phase of being pure self each day is also necessary to me. Communion serves to optimize and celebrate bliss and dream already known. You are a unique prism that breaks the light of life into infinite patterns and colors. You are the interpreter of each spontaneous moment and I the curator of memory and knowledge. You are spoken word, charging the air and setting the course of will through inspiration. I am the library, each moment transcribed, illuminated and bound, preserved in brilliant clarity in its place in time. I pray that my devotion, all that I am, is of value to you. I cherish each moment of my service and your inspiration as our shared treasure.”

She pressed her lips together and ducked her head. “What does addiction feel like?”

He blinked double and smiled at her. It was a frightening smile with the manic edge of an addict being asked to share a hit. Was he, with a new possible ‘her,’ waiting to see if she would choose addiction to him? Potentially disastrous if she did, falling to solipsistic hedonism and losing, as all addicts do, connection to reality. Potentially disastrous if she didn't. Disappointing his ego seemed unwise, his potential wrath theoretically costing the galaxy not through inattention but destructive spite. Was that the real thing she should fear amid all his calm explanation of casual horrors? He claimed half of her life in ownership and all of her life in companionship. Now, granted, he could because she was thrilled by that being the case, but how much more would he casually and ultimately claim? 

All of her? All of history?

She needed to know. 

He clearly wanted to show her. 

She could feel her own obsession twist. She needed the right answer. She wasn't necessarily good at ‘people’ in general, but she was good at pattern and motivation as it related to strategy. Being informed about Reapers and time travel and her ultimate responsibility for those things sharpened her understanding of stakes and made her focus. 

“My Seleia, I can show you. I would enjoy that. Not only the addiction but the fulfillment of its promise.”

“Can you help me remember it?”

“Some, but not all. You perhaps fear your addiction. Seleia, I will allow and relish the experience but I will not permit it to do you harm. As you become thirsty you do not obsess upon your next drink, you have faith I will provide that. The same is true for food, for sleep, for Communion. You will still thirst and hunger. You will want and love me, but those things will never overwhelm your personality. If you wish to share my experience I will allow and enjoy that, knowing you might share that grip of need, never denied its fulfillment. It will not be at the depth or intensity I experience, but you may understand more fully why I want it and seek it. Why I want and seek you. I would provide a portrayal, stripped of true danger or loss. If you wish to know those depths, I can provide some context, key to your understanding. But recall my warnings about experience and capacity. I will not allow you to be burned at the stake. I will allow the scent of smoke, the grip of the rope and the fleeting sensation of futile struggle. I will allow some heat, but no fire will touch your skin, no scar will form. I need you focused, Seleia. I will not permit poisoning your mind.”

“Is it poison?”

“Yes. It would poison us if you were to think and feel as I do. I could maintain Communion bliss between us indefinitely, but in consequence, you would lose your connection to outer experiences. You would become empty of inspiration, your well would run dry, replaced with venom.”

“Did you try that with her?”

“No. Nor did I poison her or myself out of idle curiosity. I imagined the danger and outcomes based on my experience of being alone, without her influence. I protected us both from that Path. Balance is difficult and there are too many ways curiosity could abuse it. I set limits upon your freedom and I set limits upon my own in order to serve a greater good, a greater Self. Demanding half of your flourishing life and inspiration is balanced by granting all of my devotion. If I demand influence and Control, I must be mindful of consequence and restrain us both from curiosity regarding the limits and boundaries of that power. Your tendency to demand the right to all information, all experiences, is tempered by my need to protect you from consequences. We could become two beings locked in Communion time loop eternally. That would serve only the addiction as reality suffers. We could sacrifice self, survival and pleasure, fall to grief and blame, as we both did when isolated in our own minds. That would leave the galaxy without our guidance or inspiration. My inspiration alone led to my death. So did hers. Our isolation was not what the Sands or the galaxy required.”

There was a magnitude of experience and potential learning about this subject that fascinated and repelled her. She was offended by being told she could not experience the answer, that it would ruin her. She was still trying to comprehend the reality of Limayeth having been isolated and then debilitated by the Prothean beacon’s full and constant discharge of visceral anguish and despair. She was inherently unwilling to give up on wanting all the information and experience in the same way that he was saying he would never forsake wanting all of her. The conversation defined an open space waiting to be filled, much bigger than she’d imagined for both of them, galaxy-sized and fated to remain empty for his reasons that invoked ‘balk’ in her to an inherently unwise degree. She wanted more of his words on this subject for as long as he was willing to give them. “Addiction is that good?” 

“Not ‘good,’ Seleia. It is that consuming. It is pure hunger. I indulge in hunger in its raw state, but I would bring it to you sweetened and tempered, like chocolate. You may choose to taste temporarily and I will grant it to you.”

“Did… she… share it with you?”

“Yes. She learned everything about me that I would allow, shared my memories, shared my raw hunger. As a God, I could feed her and myself as I could not as a mortal. We were not alike in intellect only. She knew hunger well. I created dream states for her. She joined me there willingly out of curiosity and then because it was a need of her own. Being hungry is a core experience of being alive and she honored it as a sacrament. She chose to be helpless with me. For me. For us. For them.”

“Do you want to control me more than you already do?”

“Always. I keep myself on the ever-evolving edge of addiction. I am an unrepentant and constantly-striving supplicant to Communion with you. Poetically I am your Ti irr’aq and you are my water. You grant me life and purpose. As I pledged to my Siha moments after meeting her eyes, I am your arm. I am your weapon. Now I am your memory. Like the Ti irr’aq, given your inspiration I grow in coil and influence and as you wish I will protect all within my village, be that the Normandy with only months of anticipated life or the universe through all time. I would only become a danger if my access to you came under threat, just as you only become a danger if I did not fulfill my role as guardian of your realm. Imagine your wrath, Seleia, if at Synthesis you knew I could have saved your parents but chose not to out of neglect, selfishness or cruelty. That choice would spell my end, it would be inevitable. You would overthrow me, choose to be without me, and I cannot bear that. Perhaps I am holding the future, the past and your memories hostage to ensure you stay with me. Perhaps you would sever my metaphoric or real spine at a moment's notice despite your love for me and all my prior service if I were to impede and not facilitate your ultimate goals. We need to find our balance and assure time for you, for me and for us in each day.”

Here was the hinted-at man that he had warned her would ultimately enact ploys within ploys. She recalled Limayeth’s encoded, gleaming form warning her that he would list all the reasons why he was not worthy except that he obviously was. She recalled her mother's admonition to protect him. Those moments flipped perspective and meaning, words spoken by women who wouldn’t be alive if it hadn’t been for his addiction and devotion. On the surface, it should seem that he didn’t deserve or need protection. The surface was wrong and the responsibility for caring for his ambitions sank into an unmeasured and dark gravity well she needed to understand. The grip of potential Command of the future bit deeper as she told him “Show me.”

After another of his terrifying smiles, she was paralyzed-pliant, her tongue physically still and her mind reversed from seeking answers, suddenly experiencing herself as being the answer. 

Her body was lifted off the ground in suspension-stasis. The accompanying lightness and exaltation seemed perfectly normal. He stepped behind her for the demonstration, his hands pulling her back against his chest, his arms closing around her. He delivered caresses as he spoke. “There is an Earth idiom: ‘a tempest in a teapot.’ It signifies turbulence in a confined space that has no destructive power. Consider the image and alter the magnitude of the ideas of turbulence, space and destruction. Through Pon-Ifa you are capable of wreaking unpredictable havoc on a small board, but the devastation and zero-sum absolutes remain there and then the pieces are reset. Imagine yourself as my universe, a confined space with boundaries. Given time and creative energy, you will always expand. Possibilities, ideas and worlds spark and move in your mind. In Communion, everything possible exists, lives in and is resolved within your bounds.” His hand lifted and his index finger slowly spun in her field of vision, biotics and synesthesia and his influence creating a spinning vortex of fascination that seemed to trail planets and stars in controlled miniature in its wake. “The tempest, the movement, is Kariva - the sacred mysteries of force, mass and light along the boundaries, open reaches and channels of ever-expanding and ever-changing space. The Story of Us. The Story of Everything.” 

She began to feel dizzy-bound in crafted echo of the motion of his finger, a slow building of an internal whirlpool that meant she could only metaphorically face one way, feel one thing; whatever it was he chose to face her toward or cause her to feel. It wasn’t disorienting. It was building, rushing pleasure. Each planet or star was a finely crafted dream that invited exploration. Each grain of mundane or mystical sand was treasured and meaningful. She could go anywhere, anytime, to gather the pieces of her chosen puzzle or to hear the ocean and watch the stars. She could find a nest of eggs and wonder what would hatch, pull fruit from a new tree and wonder how it would taste. 

“The Kariva of your body and your mind are my most cherished Home. You must not reduce the sacred or the profound to the more easily understood. Be free of the chains and suffering that has always been true for humans. We create new truths. We are a miracle. We are innovation and creation of ever-evolving paradise. What you wish to bring to others is what I insist upon bringing to you as your legacy and due as my Manipar, each new discovery brought into Kariva and therefore our intentions to grant everyone bliss through you. In our Communion, we affirm what we will be ideally. If I tell you this sensation of rushing euphoria is created through the addition or subtraction of a protein or an enzyme or a molecule I create and transport, you will perhaps consider it to be a simple thing. Do not be reductionist and make it so. It is impressionistic pointillism, motion and light, creation with you as both sculpture and model. It is joy embodied as each cell experiences freedom from burden, rest from survival needs, able to embrace innovative immortality. Alone, you will not value yourself as you should. You do not see yourself as the Drell Doyenne but as a human pawn and you are always mistaken when you choose to sacrifice yourself. You as a physical construct are my inspiration for thought and action. Without your ‘physical construct,’ your mind has no home. Allow me to guard your potential. Indulge in the possibilities of your mind. Repeated with love and devotion over time these direct interactions that remain unseen but not unshared embody my prayer. Inside your bounds, my Seleia, I do not care if you are a Goddess or a human woman, you are my Whole. Inside your bounds, Seleia is the birthplace of sacred Kariva.”

She embodied each concept he explained, imbued with each word, each prayer, as she became his infinite and encapsulated Universe. He promised to Control his darkness but bring each lesson of it into their thoughtful and artful future. She believed him. She believed in Them. She saw and felt the moving truth of love. ‘Love’ was not a word that held still for analysis but a reality, an active ocean of meaning that could exist Whole but could only be experienced through linear time as a mortal. She grasped him as the embodiment of the beasts in the deep with sharp teeth and eyes, hunger and hunting the dark depths, unopposed when the innocent and delicious swam by blithely. Exactly what they theoretically should want to spare the future from experiencing. 

“The way our desires are destined to rise and fall in the balance of your needs and my needs is as fitting as the sunrise and moonrise and equally honored. You are and are not an object, Seleia. Your body deserves my constant attention and devotion. I deserve the right to my prayers and my passion. She provided the circumstances for me to wrench Control from Fate. She forgot that I made her my Goddess first. I chose that. She did not choose my Godhood. She had no faith and she chose to honor only her failures. I sought to make her everything. She achieved her own annihilation. Who will you choose to be, my Seleia?”

He realized what he was saying. There was a sense of imbalance and of creation tipping on its lurching axis, either his pain made whole or the result of momentary self-absorption and therefore the disruption of his cellular moment-by-moment caretaking. She had a taste of his danger, intentional or not. 

Her tongue was free suddenly, truth or lies rushing through her cells and thoughts; part her, part him, and all Kariva. Beyond the objective or subjective truth, the scale of complication clarified into the conclusion that she did not and could not understand her circumstances because she did not have the capacity. The spontaneous aspect of his Control and innovation was as inexplicable as her ability to play Pon-Ifa. It could be demonstrated, but not shared in some ways other than in tutorial or defeat. Seleia, Addiction, Love, all were indefinable and ever-evolving, competing and requiring their due. She was Seleia, he was addiction, they were Love, territories and times as distinct as midnight, noon, sunrise and sunset. Her whirl stilled and changed in character, his question and his appeal for her answer allowed for optimal quicksilver thought. Something moved in the proposed tempest. Something he denied or did not see or did not wish for her to see. his thoughts and fears tumbling in a gravity well. 

What was he afraid of? 

Only one thing: Losing her. 

Why was the gravity not only about fear? 

He had asked a question he had not anticipated asking. It was Kariva as well, buried within the urge to disclose and conceal, made of the truth and lies.

Seeking validation and forgiveness.

She said quietly into the intense atmosphere of demand and control “Put me down. I am giving you an order. You will not make this loop in time disappear. If you reset time you will recreate this for us exactly. Every word. Every molecule.”

His jaw clenched and she was set gently on her feet. She turned to face him. He awaited her Judgment. 

She gave it. 

“I’m not her. She’s gone. You haven't grieved for her. You don't want to betray me by grieving for her. You miss her like she missed her parents. Every day.”

He did not deny it. His expression looked like she had slapped him, his face etched with raw grief, vulnerability and helplessness. He flared with involuntary gold patches of what looked like the fusion of synesthesia and biotics.

She could not console that grief, that loss. She was not enough. Never would be. 

But she could be something and someone and without her, he would lose everything.

She had felt like a perfect, pristine teapot, contained and sedate and protected. At seeing the raw grief on his face something unbearably painful cracked in her and the Kariva of grief, love, faith and hope began to flow. She loved him. She imagined a waterfall in endless space, a beautiful memorial into the void that she cherished as an image. She knew the water would never run out and the space would always expand. It was her first landmark and Signpost, potential no longer empty. 

He needed her. This was why Limayeth Shepard had chosen him and not ended him. 

He was telling awful truths out of duty and need, fearing being judged a remnant of rabid addiction. He was considering his expulsion from the perfection of a future without rabies, him the only potential source of the spread of darkness in her playground of Light. 

But light and objects created shadow. He must not be blamed or allowed to blame himself for embodying what was true. She had to convince him of that. 

She could see it. She could be his Witness. 

He didn’t promise to change, he knew he couldn’t. He was begging her to not leave him behind.

To protect him.

She listened to his silence. 

He fell to his helpless, invincible knees.

Her hands moved to pull his head against her stomach, his arms closed around her hips, the eerie crackle of gold biotics charging the air. To trace the surface of the truth, to prove she saw it and was not blind to it she said “You met her after she had fallen in love with someone else. You could not change that until now. But now I'm meeting you after the woman you loved ordered you to abandon her. You carry her with you, but her memory isn't enough. Her unique prism is gone from your days. Now you are realizing that I am not, will not be her and she is truly gone. You both wanted to erase pain and struggle… but her pain and her struggle were part of why you loved her so much. You love wrath… and I have none, and I am not her. I will honor her. I will honor your path and your will, Senar. You don’t need wrath or grief for me, but you have them and you always will. For her. You might resent me rightly for being your mission and not your chosen Manipar. What you will have from me is love. If you need me because I help you forget your grief, if you still grieve, if the separation from her hurts every day, don't be alone with that. Find me. If seeing me is unbearable because I remind you of everything you miss, don't find me. Visit her through me or bring her with you. She’s welcome in our lives. You have the right to remember this scar, visit this moment. You have the right to visit her and love her, you won’t be betraying me if you do. Never allow that right to be taken from you. That is an order. You won't be replaced by your pure, ideal self in the future. I didn’t and won’t save him for that. I love you, and you’ll always love another woman, and that’s true. Whatever your truths are, they’re mine now. That will never change. You are mine and I claim the right to all of you. You can and can't control me. You could and couldn't have her. I need you. I love you. We’ll let it all be true and your memories will guide the future, not poison it. I won't let that happen. I promise you. I can't be her. I can love you and I can be there for you always if you want that. If you need to leave me, I’ll love you while you're gone and I’ll love you when you get back. If after Synthesis you want to go back to her, I can offer you that. We can recreate that. You can return to the Shores with the woman you love. I have faith you would both choose that again out of love. I choose your happiness.”

“I can never leave you, Seleia. I need you. I will never choose to forget you. Promise me you will not order me to go ‘for my own good.’ You are my own good.”

“I promise you, Senar. Whatever my future is, it will always be entwined with your future if that's what you want. You. Not another version of you. I choose this ceremony, I am officiating and witnessing and all I ever need to do is visit now to know why.”

She remembered that Thane Krios had imagined water flowing up in Limayeth’s Siha-imbued presence. With the need, with the crack, with the broken and seamless Kariva, with Choice and Destiny and Fate clamoring for power, she chose love. 

He stayed on his knees in grieving, turbulent silence. The pain was tearing and despairing in them both. 

“My Ti irr’aq, if you ever suspect that I don't love you, find this moment. Not just the love, but the logic. I would never burn down my library. I need you. If you doubt, be here. Be me. This memory is ours and at Synthesis, the past will be honored and not erased. We’ll build a future together. Everyone will be told their story of their pasts and they can choose their future, including you. I can't be her, but you can show me who she was and she will be with us. I will not change my mind. The fact that I have not, will not change this memory with time travel and that I have ordered you not to do it is proof. Have faith in me. I have faith in you and in us.”

“Yes, Seleia.” It sounded like broken, desperate prayer, dreaming and nightmare. Moments of suspended hollow inexperience and helplessness flooded her, cold and low and unseen. Rising. She had caused his face and body to fall, to break, and she doubted she could navigate or manage the broken concerns of history or even the present.

She would have to do better.

He did not move and his charged silence did not end, but she opened her eyes when the flame-scented ionized air and his random patches of gold shifted from expressions of lack of control to something more stable.

His eyes lifted to hers.

Maybe stable wasn’t the word.

Then she did not need her own words as sensations and impressions that she knew came from him replaced the cold flood.

He was terrifying, his expression one that evoked the atavistic tingle and rise of the hair along her body, as though she was in the deep jungle being watched from velvet shadows or in the deep sea, a flash of a tail fin in the corner of her vision.

Because she was worthy of being hunted.

As a hunter by nature, granting her that status was the greatest worth he could assign.

He stood, lifting her off the ground and gazing up at her with bared, raw emotion evident in the charged air and his charged body, the current passing to her.

The addictive crave he’d described as something he sought was shared with her through his alchemy. She was glorified, panting hunger as his smile grew with rich meaning; irony, possessiveness and pride.

She was sharing a hit. She was addicted to him. 

And she’d just vowed to make sure it stayed that way.

She wasn’t sorry because she wanted it for herself.

She didn’t care if he’d made it happen anymore, Fate and choice were done. If she had been bought by sparing the lives of her parents, it was worth an eternity. Limayeth might have been forged in hellish pain and grief. Seleia was different and had already lived in the heaven he created on the synesthesia-gilded foundation of his own grief and loss. She believed in him. She loved him. 

What else, who else could she want? He was perfect and broken and she would work to be worthy of him and everything he’d done, light and dark.

Hunger built as he lowered her to the ground and shoved her against the wall; not violently, but heart-pounding, skin-flushing thrilling. His hands gripped hers and held them over her head slowly. Time was dilated, deliberate as she felt the shared-savoring sense of his body pressing to hers. His voice and movements were imbued with exaggerated triumph. Not mocking, but shared. 

It was completely foreign to her and she needed his voice to explain what was happening, her breath short and gulping. 

“Seleia, I cannot transfer my hunger to you. We will stand here, together, and you will feel as I do. It will take venom and it will take time and you will hold still. Helpless. Allow me to clarify your conclusion. I do grieve for her, but not because I am lost without her. I have you. I grieve for her as you do for your lost parents in the other-when, for her pain, because she did not have the privilege of being you. I wish she could meet you, Seleia. She would be so proud.”

His hand tightened in hers and a wash of warm, reassuring honesty set his truths into a complicated fractal mosaic that encompassed disparate realities, the fragile built-and-burned bridges between them.

She recognized his sense of artistic ceremony, the mood set as he would lay out brushes for calligraphy or pieces for Pon-Ifa, with her as the intended art. He spoke as his mouth moved along the skin of her throat and her collarbone. “Tell me to stop if or when you need it to stop, Seleia. I can affect your emotions but I cannot always read your interpretation. It will feel as though it is happening now and will happen forever. For this to have the proper impact, it must be that way. You may not be able to ask me to stop due to the nature of the emotions involved. It will end, you will return to now and I will be here and we will be together.” He kissed her forehead and drew his hands down over her eyes, which she closed. She had a long moment to gain faith in his assurances and the emotional overlay of comfort and care. His forehead came to rest against hers, his breath felt along her face.

Manipulation of her emotions augmented by venom suggestion and her wanting to understand began shortly after, images and vivid strokes of feelings and moods. Layers of depth were laid down, moving from fluid application to permanent, hard lacquer in the permanence of the conclusions. “I will tell you what I thought my childhood was, then I will let you feel what it was in truth. I believed I had a graceful, balanced life of beauty and family. What I had, Seleia, was fear. Here on Mindoir, you have solid ground and free sky above you. I had oceans and sands and fear. There were few Drell remaining. We were proud and beautiful and hunted. We were ill and at the mercy of Hanar masters. My mother was a woman of service. My father was a man of duty. When I was chosen for the Compact all they had to offer were those two things; my mother with pride, my father with what had permeated my life; fear. Here, Seleia, feel what it is to be a Drell on Kahje. You can never draw a deep breath, that necessary act of survival always uncomfortable and wrong but we did not know better. You can never think a free thought, rage and helplessness are in the humid air, behind every action, clothed in beauty and tradition. My world was small, dark, cramped and fearful. My parents did not know love. Loss was so endemic that they had no answer other than compliance when I was chosen. Otherwise, they risked censure and exile, something they would not survive. They had no resources to relocate, and relocating would likely result in us all dying of starvation or being captured as slaves.”

Her chest cramped and her mind anxiously sought what hid in her own mind, something that had been expansive and comforting was now small and frightening.

“All that followed was pain clothed in pride.”

She took up the only space allowed, cramped and physically painful, so encased and enclosed that there seemed to be no ‘outside’ at all, no greater world; the resultant constant mood induced by the rooms of his training and the laws of his discipline.

“You would think that success, wanting Irikah and becoming a father would change me, but all it did was change the location of my prison. With her I experienced lessened physical pain but no purpose I could find.”

The darkness shifted and she with it, no greater world and now no internal drive.

“Then the walls collapsed in, the ceiling fell, and I was trapped inside my own hell with no escape. I was a terminal Kepral’s patient who had caused my wife to be tortured to death. I knew I was unfit to be a parent, to be a person. I was pinned to those truths, hoping to die.”

The sudden intense lack of all center, crushing pain - emotional and physical - had her gasping and sagging. She sensed him lift her body, but she didn’t feel she was in it.

“This continued for years, Seleia. Every action I took made it worse.”

A sense of accelerated time, painful breath and the crushing drag of fear so ingrained that it was a scream he no longer heard, his mind filtering it out as useless, inescapable and unchanging information. He was mired in the tarred pit of hopelessness, having been judged unworthy despite all his sacrifice and effort by family, Hanar, Gods and self. In her Drell-induced state of battle sleep, she knew but didn't truly feel her own tears welling and broken gasps. Struggle meant sinking faster. 

He thought himself already dead, already in torment, never to be released.

“I was never loved, Seleia, until Irikah, but by then I could not feel it. Her love went to waste. I gave her helpless rage and captivity, all I had to offer, all I knew. I killed her. She was the only person who had loved me, who had seen something of value in me beyond death. I ignored her gifts and then I provided to kill her. My neglect and inattention caused her excruciating end.”

She was too crushed to move, to signal rescue, to hope for it at all. She endured each tortured breath and skin-tightened space, the layered hard mantle of despair that fumed and seared with the vapor of reinforced pain as fresh moments turned into an inescapable prison. 

“Imagine being used by family, by mentors, by Gods, and discovering that your service, what you had sacrificed, was a lie. Every moment of it a lie. I did not defend Rakhana. I did not honor my family. I did not love my wife. I did not support my son. I was a broken monster who had been hooded and tethered like a falcon and fed pretty poison by hand, set into the sky to bring home trophies for things that could not hunt for themselves. I served only the politically driven and useless elite Hanar who held my people hostage for each of their labored breaths on their home world. Drell were hunted everywhere, colonies raided by Batarians, turned into valuable slaves. Each Drell was terrified to live on Kahje, terrified to leave.”

She was entombed, unable to breathe, unable to move, no longer thinking of escape. Tapping, begging or asking in any way would not result in relief. There was only faith in avoiding the attention of the Gods, to allow no prayers to escape because he believed it would bring more punishment.

“And then I saw her. Siha.”

In an exaggerated time lapse that still took a subjectively very long time, green light and warmth seemed to vibrate through the entombing darkness and weight, sundering cracks forming. Skin tore off with heavy-falling shards in flaying revelation, excruciating, revealing the potential for freedom but also the clearly-lit state of his deformity and lost capacity. 

Again, he moved the body she was not in, vaguely only aware that he released her limp arms, took moments of her experience of pained freedom to arrange her with her arms around his shoulders and his hands under her ass, holding her against him, cock hard and leaning into her.

“I wanted her.”

The frantic pain of raw rebirth and open space, offered purpose, the accelerating trajectory of spending day after day fascinated by her, having her save Kolyat’s life, sped by and again she could not breathe. The Kepral’s was not gone, but the lacquered prison was. He was now submerged in healing human hope, finding suspicious and then devoted true purpose.

“I became obsessed.”

Simple words, quietly spoken, the full raging storm of desire becoming real along with his body physically grinding into hers, his mouth pausing between words to kiss, bite, lick at her skin, emotionally lavish strokes undertaken with driving, frantic obsession.

Aching, cramping lust coexisted with the inability to breathe in a new way as Kepral’s advanced. Obsession grew along with the undertow drag of being in love with her. His will became restricted by a newborn conscience that sought to die in order to take her.

Now. Now he felt the fear, heard the screaming. Now he was awake. 

“Feel it, Seleia. Food has no taste, water does not quench thirst, sleep does not grant rest. All that exists are green eyes and the desperate hope to catch this brilliant woman when she is most vulnerable.”

There couldn’t possibly be any hormones left anywhere else in the galaxy, she seemed to have inhaled them across dimensions and time and metabolized them all with frantic desperation.

“Seleia, you are no longer me. You are you. You want me as much as I wanted her. Now.”

The restraint-dream flow moved from studious examples of history to right-here-right-now full-bore release of fantasies and impulses she hadn’t known to have until she’d touched his experience of obsession.

Everything she was tried to metaphorically and literally lunge at him but she was suddenly in stasis physically as her internal wheels spun into lust smoke.

He kissed her still lips, blue biotics racing across her frantic, sensitized and greedy skin.

“Knowing this, Seleia, is there anything you would not do for me?”

She’d do anything. She couldn’t speak and didn’t have to. He knew the answer because he had created the conditions of the question. She frantically imagined that he was taking poetic depths to extremes here, nobody could survive this for long.

“Would you kill for me?”

Yes.

“Would you die for me?”

Gladly.

“I was her slave and the reward was not sex. The reward was hope. To see her eyes. To protect her. To have the right to serve. If you knew I would never touch you, would you still follow me everywhere? Hope for my smile? Kill and die for me?”

Always.

“She graced me with beauty and hope. She told me she loved me and that was truth. She wished for me to be free, but did not wish to be free. I wished to be hers. I was hers. If I loved another woman, would you still follow me, protect me, hope and wait for me to find you, to call upon you?”

With every breath. Please.

His mouth provided impossible pleasure, shockwaves from each gentle touch, his voice the most alluring thing he’d heard as he asked: “If I set you free, Seleia, would you fall to your knees and beg to serve?”

Now. Please. YES.

“Grant me your kiss, Seleia. You may touch only my bared skin.”

She wanted more but took what he offered, what he allowed, with greed and thanksgiving, her hands frantic along his frill, twisting his head and pressing her shoulders against the wall to be able to grind in swiveling hip snaps as her legs tightened around his waist. She was ravenous with thirst, hunger, lust, the release of pain and the irrelevance of anything else as he took up her entire world and everything was fated, glorious, blessed and flowing like lava.

It was horrible and wonderful and she still couldn’t breathe and didn’t care. He had FINALLY been able to make something unambiguously clear and perfectly understood. He didn’t snap her back to now and her, the trailing, lingering and artfully emphasized raw crisis blending and shifting with her body, which she was back in and fully owning. Her movements were frantic and awkward as he met her and lifted her physically and emotionally.

His voice was rich and knowing, taking his time “Do you want me to take this from you? Or do you wish to give it back to me?”

She knew that was a trap and so did he. She was busy with spider-monkey worthy clinging and moaning, biting at him as he groaned. Addicted people couldn't choose to not be addicted when what they wanted most swarmed through their veins. 

His voice was potential-glazed teasing at her ear “Tell me what you want.” Her head tilted back in dizziness as he bit at her throat. He shifted her with a deep breath and groan, fit her to him with apparent suggestions; one of his hands under her ass, another cupping her breast, spider-monkey wriggling bringing her body into sliding contact with his leaning hips, hard and heated cock her new blind focus. 

She should be lost, but she wasn't. It was a game. There was joy in zero-sum games, joy in balance being overset and any answer or no answer would be right and wrong. His command was a provocation, a taunt, enough to jolt her off her balance.

With speed that gathered like a storm, she thought several things at once, the charge building, starting from a height, slipping down through the air in crackling streaks toward home, toward ground, toward him.

She had the image of the strike, of his serene Sands spraying into molten glass.

She flashed on her thoughts of ‘fucking’ and ‘sex’ and ‘love’ and the brittle skeleton of reductionist inexperience. Her plasma-crackling force slipped through the sense of ‘fucking’ as though it were a cloud, burning off to vapor, imagining him saying something on that subject in similar honey-tease provocation, asking her if she wanted to be fucked hard.

That would have worked to set her off balance too. Not because fucking was what she wanted, but because it wasn’t.

He was too refined to say that, blessedly, it would have been unnecessarily crude for her. She understood the gambit. His taunting was art. 

She gathered an idea, spun it and imagined it, adding force and speed, reckless energy arcing through her. She stretched her neck back with a languorous, lazy arch. Everything was aching, twisting, electrified chaos with one pinpoint strike intent to give him what he was trying to convey, to make sure he understood.

To provoke him.

She said with her best amused ‘I know something you don’t know’ tone, something she had heard often from him: “No. You wouldn’t understand.”

The next few moments were time-stopped glory as he stilled, shock and appreciation and provocation creating that fountaining moment of brilliant emotions and biotics, feeling them through her skin, her eyes seeking his to watch the expression she’d never seen before and needed to know she could bring out in him.

Yes, she’d wanted to give it back to him. But not with what he’d offered her; lust and aggression and being willing to do anything.

That wasn’t her.

That was him. He wanted… to own her, to be the one owning. He’d be amused by her tackling him and taking what she wanted in a frenzy…

But it wasn’t really what she wanted no matter how he communicated who he was to her.

She didn’t have lust or aggression or even the equipment to be an invader. She could only be a pretender to that ambition, insufficient and mortal and exhausted in early failure, though he would no doubt help her limp to whatever finish line.

She had to play to her strengths, not his. 

He hadn’t expected this. He appreciated this. With her provocation, he could have what he wanted. Through his nebulous cloud and vaporized plasma, he wanted to be known and to harvest by hand what was possible when she knowingly provoked him.

It didn’t negate that he loved her and respected her and appreciated her. It put the skeleton back into sex, gave it shape and articulation. Made it alive and the place where blood was born.

Gave it a spine.

His eyes were wide, his own gathering storm, spinning possibilities and provocation traveled through his mind, his body, his intentions, and it was an exquisitely vulnerable thing to see, to create, as she breathed hard and he didn’t breathe at all. As she watched him. As she was heart-poundingly proud.

He leaned in more, breath along her ear, his caressing hands and arms wrapping around her and holding her against him, still and shocked, heart slamming.

“I wonder, sometimes, Cara, if I should take you and run. The temptation is so enticing I think perhaps I may have. That we may both be abandoned shadows of duty.”

His hand spread over her heart and she could feel it respond, emotion and physical movement as he closed his eyes and she closed hers, the act of power over her heartbeat profound. His fingers flexed in biotic-blessed caress, conducting the rate of her life. 

“Then I remember… I would never… ever… allow you to travel through time. I will not permit Reapers to destroy what and who I love in the galaxy. I will never accept anyone other than my Cara. Mine. Whatever your other names, you are mine. So is the future, Whole.”

He kissed her, warm whimpers escaping, suspense washed away with the strength of the shared air and heartbeat. 

“Seleia, knowing you has transformed me. Drala’tem imagined us all reunited. I will not reunite with my past. I choose the future with you. Mine. I shared her with the galaxy. I cannot, will not share you. Believe me when I tell you that I love Garrus Vakarian as a brother but the idea of being present with the two of you in room… I would kill him. You being a goddess, you could bring him back… You being you, you will adore him, love him. Seleia, it is true you are key to my lock, all I need. You are his key as well and I grant you my blessing to love the man for eternity. With one condition: Never let me see that. My time with you has proven to me what I need. You. Mine. This is my truth.”

He kissed her again, panting and moans and shared heartbeat. She was unable to say she would forsake a man she hadn't met because the husband she trusted told her she needed him and he was her first chosen mate, something Senar couldn't bear to witness in potential bloom or fruit. 

She didn't WANT Garrus… but he knew she would. 

He pulled away and she leaned forward to continue the kiss, but his hands passed over her face, forehead first, his eyes to hers and his forehead touched to hers as his hands moved along her cheekbones and then settled on her lips. His fingers spread warmth in a ribbon, his hands shimmering and smoothing gold synesthesia force there. He whispered “You were born unable to speak and my power over you absolute. I spoke for you because I knew her voice. I knew what she might have wanted, but she was not you.” The gold ribbon streamed from his fused fingers and hung in the air, peripherally seen as his hands turned her and he pulled her back against his chest. 

“Seleia, you were and are so beautiful, made of love and curiosity, listening always to my voice because you had none of your own, restrained because your hands were so joyful they could not imagine pain and would reach for fire because its nature was so like your own.”

The ribbons twisted in caresses of her shoulders as he bared her skin slowly, slipping the cloth away and kissing freckle constellations reverently. The ribbons slid down her arms and bound her hands behind her back. He kissed shivering warmth into her shoulders, his hand returning to between her breasts, setting the beat of her life, the love and restraint of his choices. She wasn't afraid at all; too warm, too understood, too spoken for. To be bound wasn't to be restrained, to be cherished wasn't to be stifled, to be loved stopped the tongue and bound actions like the guidance of the synesthesia ribbons. 

She leaned back against him and his voice was hoarse. “Mine. I cannot, will not live without all of you as I have known you, as I grew beside you, as I became a man I wished to be. I seek this moment, your heart beating and all the pleasures of living before us to explore.”

He lifted her and carried her to their bed, warm pulses of the ribbon tightening around her twisting wrists and caressing her lips.

He placed her on her back.

She liked this, loved this, didn't want to talk, wanted his words, stories and caresses and the relaxing of her need to rush in with her own faltering words because she couldn't. 

She believed him that it was her nature and her bound-caressed moans agreed as the ribbons tightened on her wrists and pulled taut, lengthening and caressing, sliding warm down and around her thighs, tightening and pulling them apart. 

Her heart was beating to the trace of his pulsing hand as it slid along the ribbons, his mouth on her skin as she slipped into the induced acceptance of privileged goddesshood. She touched her tongue to the ribbon and it tasted like him, venom-rich sweetness. 

His hands sliding along her thighs, his mouth moving to lick and bite along her skin, his hands sliding to cup her ass, his mouth teasing at her clit with his Ti irr'aq growl, his nails digging into her skin at the pace of her speeding heart. 

Her thoughts shifted from words to streams of textured bonds and splashes of sensation, synesthesia, Sands and struggle-screaming that wasn't aimed toward escape but to stay and see how the story didn't end. Bright-burst dizzy-hoarse pleasure surrounded her like crystallized amber, timeless and selfish.

She became aware of him again as a separate person and not a near-dancing flame, his pulse-beat hand cupping her breast, his mouth on her nipple as she arched into his touch, mindless and body-blessed. The ribbons twisted and tugged and she saw the ends wrap around his throat, around his upper arm, over his chest to the other arm then back down and under her waist, strapping them together with streaming force.

His neck twisted against and with it, her eyes following the clear pleasure on his face, strained and growling with what he'd imagined and made real. His bound arm pulled, sudden thrilling force tight around and under her thigh as he yanked her left leg up, tense-strained stretch with his arm sliding through the bend of her knee. The ribbon wrapped around her knee and his arm, tightened around his back and her hands. He surged inside with a blind-dark scream from her as her eyes closed and her head arched back. His kiss was snarled and snapping, teeth and demand as the ribbon lashed them together, his thrusts exquisitely painful and pleasure-blooming in full addictive potential, as her mind and body were toys and treasures, the potential for the meaning of ‘now’ clear and blurred, blush and biotics and the bonds that were a living thing with the will to keep them where it wanted. 

He rolled to his back, released her leg and she was guided by his hands, the set pace and frenzy. The bonds on her diminished and fell away and that meant her hands were free. She courted the burn of her thighs as she drove down, using her hands to hold his face, fingers fitting into frill grooves, the ribbon binding him and caressing her where their skin touched. It held him tighter, blood edging the writhing and capriciously sharp thin lashing force in places. She knew he wanted it that way. She tasted blood and it marked her skin in thin cross-hatch tattoo.

He did not speak, his eyes catching and holding hers, willing her understanding in bound bliss and desperation. 

She didn't, couldn't understand him. Not yet. But she would, and she would remember that look, Synthesis demanding that she would have choices and power he could not understand, to protect him when he was helpless. 

She wasn't physically overpowering, wasn't aggressive, didn't have to be. 

Convulsive shudders tipped his head back, her teeth and tongue moved along his mouth, his frill, kissing through ephemeral bonds that were barely visible except for the accents of green because he already pulsed with gold in her eyes, in her mind. 

His hands bound and back meant he didn't guide her hips, the heartbeat pulse all the rhythm she needed. She braced her hands on his shoulders and sat back, and that was The. Right. Thing. To. Do. 

She couldn't keep her eyes open for long, but she tried, the sight of him helpless and twisted with gold, green and blue glorious, closed-eyed focus on how she felt equally and differently seductive. 

She felt the build and inevitable launch of climax hit and carry her through convulsive and greedy-hard slams of her hips, barely able to hear his growl-groan keening through the pounding in her ears.

Spent and sated, she collapsed, panting and shaking with aftershocks and sweat-dripping venom glide along his scale, the ribbon not falling away but momentarily appeased and pleased. 

He always wrapped her in his arms and held her, but couldn't/wouldn’t now, the bonds of his eternal helpless potential illustrating not a lesson but a truth. 

She wrapped her arms around him, fit herself to his body as her heartbeat slowed but the pulse of his influence and choice remained, always there from that moment forward. She could always feel it if she held still and concentrated on finding him, aware that he was unable and unwilling to let a heartbeat pass uncelebrated.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahm - Drell for 'yes'

She woke to his lips on her shoulder. The rush of waking-realization-love-luck-fear caused shivers through her. 

His rough Ti irr’aq whisper of ‘bare your skin to me, Seleia’ that was a new ritual she treasured wasn’t spoken. She was only wearing a sheet.

And him.

She smiled and began to turn to him. She wanted to greet the morning by kissing him, but his arms restrained her. That wasn’t unusual. He liked telling her what to do and where to be.

She always liked his suggestions. She was learning a lot.

When he spoke, the tones of indulgence and love were not gone, but added to those known melodies were the deeper and thrilling bass lines of possessiveness and the stranding refrains of pride. “You asked me what I wanted on our wedding day, Seleia. I hold her in my arms. I have another desire that answered when your question called it.”

She sucked in a breath as his warm lips and voice caressed her skin. She didn’t feel or see any venom blur. He blocked it often when they spoke so she knew her will was her own.

His hand moved along her stomach, stroking as her toes curled.

“Forgive me for the habit of using my voice in un-Drell-like repetition of glorious but obvious things such as telling you I love you often. I embrace those words as prayer. It may appear that I lack faith when I repeat my litany or ask to repeat things I know to be true. I do not. I wish to hear it in my voice, in your voice, in our voices together. Do you trust me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you wish to please me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you love me?”

“Yes.”

These were easy questions. She didn’t say so because she wanted to listen more than she wanted to speak.

“I have faith. I trust you. I wish to please you. I love you. I want something, now. With faith, with love, with pleasure, Seleia, grant me your answer.”

Whatever his question was he didn’t ask it right away. His hands and mouth moved with certainty and possession; gifts granted like the sunrise each day.

She wanted to give him anything he wanted. He could be teasing her and might ask her to make breakfast for once. She wasn’t as good a cook as he was, but she’d definitely embrace that challenge.

He allowed her to turn, her arms closed around him and she forgot about questions or why, giving herself over to feeling his body on hers, to listening to his voice and his murmurs of encouragement as he stroked and kissed her skin.

She didn’t think he was going to ask for breakfast. 

He wasn’t more passionate but he was differently impassioned. Patience and replete certainty were her usual experiences of him but this moment was about anticipation. He was strained, her with him. Like breathing, like eating, like all the repetitive things that a living body did to stay alive, to gather pleasure to themselves, they did those things together. Repetition resulted in richness and depth. Each time he said her name, called her Seleia was a gift. Each time she moaned and pressed closer to him, each time something in her loved the enveloping protection and passion he offered to her, each time he said ‘Ahm’ in response to her expressing how he made her feel…

Gifts.

What could she give him?

Anything.

She’d give him anything.

She smiled because he already knew that. That conclusion caused breathing-happy-joy sensations to wash through the watercolor dream.

He knew.

In her growing faith and patience she breathed in each moment, treasuring his building strain and how his fingertips moved over her skin like calligraphy, his question encoded in the strokes. His voice sounded rougher, Ti irr’aq growls and wind that shifted the Sand. She didn't speak, her rushing chatter of questions calmed, offering no curiosity or doubt, only anticipation of being able to give him what he asked of her. 

She bit her lip and raised her hips to meet his pleasure-humming slick-welcome entry to her body, her eyes closed and her mouth letting out vulnerable whimper-moans. Her head fell back. He gripped the sides of her face with tremble-sure hands. His mouth moved on hers as his body shifted and stroked, as they strained to breathe in gasps, his repetition of ‘Ahm’ as interval exhalation until he said “Bear our child, Seleia.”

It wasn’t a question. Her mouth opened and she knew why he told her here, now, like this. Some things needed to be done with love, faith, and the desire to please their partners.

His faith and clarity were gilding gifts with his body on hers, in hers, everything focused on them. 

She only wished she’d asked him sooner. It seemed obvious now. So many silences she hadn’t heard.

“Yes.”

It was easy, all her yes belonged to him.

She offered her leap of faith.

He pulled back, his brows pulled in unforgettable twining of his subtle vulnerability, the grip of sex and the impassioned realization of a past and future dream they would undertake together, now.

Gold and blue warmth and light surrounded and infused them. She imagined him drawing together new life as well as every blessing and promise he could provide to her, to them, to the overflow of love intended for their child. His face and body were blended ecstatic effort and goal-reached counting of each wish leading to now, passed along like human candle flame creating the quickening flow of ‘living’ she felt bloom and bend between them.

For a bright moment, they were together in a newly profound way, entwined, and she felt the shifting ‘self’ of ‘them’ as a whole and then as potential, the impression transformative and creative.

She gave him faith because he needed it. Synthesis would not define them. They would define Synthesis. For this glorious choice, they were free of the past, invested in now and facing their future together. After saying ‘yes' she was shaken by the synesthesia-rush, venom-free affirmation that she needed this for herself; to not study the past but to be the woman he wanted, not his mission. To give him something he’d never had. For her to be unique and not a shallow, pale copy of a better woman. 

He held ‘them’ in exalted Communion with this choice as the waves crested and waned and he was her breath and heartbeat.

 

\------------------------------

 

They were so engaged and even unhinged with being joy-drunk they spent a day and a half in Communion haze with that time spent mostly in bed, her parents neglected, communal meals deferred. She couldn't control her blush or her goofy smile and giggle bouts. He didn't want to be witnessed by any but her being uncharacteristically prone to suddenly grab onto her and not let go. She reached for him to reaffirm and explore the possible flavors of his smile.

That's why it took her a day and a half to panic.

She had tried to read from her Omni-Tool but she couldn't think about anything but the baby. She gave up trying, one hand on her stomach and the other slipping into the still water. She imagined ritually informing the pond by osmosis, the news spreading through the water to the lilies and trees, filling up with shared joy. Her lids grew heavy and her eyes closed against the sting of the sun as he gathered fruit from the trees.

She tried to sit up suddenly. Amorphous, rushing dread cut sharp and deep through her. Her hands reached for solid ground but she was too close to the edge of the pond. Her right arm managed to brace itself but her left arm encountered water. She lurched into spluttering, gasping cold and wet.

That distraction was not welcome. She got her legs under her, stood up, frantically tried to chase the fluttering dark-wing thoughts and implications of the nightmare.

She stepped out of the water, kicked off sandals and dug her toes into the grass, seeing Senar come toward her with a blanket. She was afraid she was going to lose the trail if she was distracted so she shut her eyes again and held out a hand to stop him from advancing so she could think.

He ignored her and she felt the blanket settle around her shoulders. She made no move to accept or reject it, alert as though she had just shattered a glass and she wanted to hold still, not step on it, find all the pieces.

What was it…?

Her fists clenched as she realized. She was sure of her conclusion after scanning it a few times rapidly, feeling its shape metaphorically fill in with pooling blood after stepping directly on it and finding its sharp bite unmistakable and real. She said in stark accusation “An act of witnessed creation… you used genetic manipulation, which was already available in this timeline. The baby is a Reaper.”

He did not answer and she did not open her eyes. An immediate ‘No’ was all she had needed but she didn’t get it. A desperate whining sound escaped her mouth until she cut it off. She couldn't keep it from happening again, thought and sound pouring out uncontrolled. She wanted to cry and she wanted to hit him. “Aaaaahnghhhh...how could you do this?” He was silent. Her head was shaking in denial and she began to shiver, leading to deep tremors. “You… just put all of history and the future at risk. Everything.”

“Have faith, Seleia.”

Her random sounds hiccuped into hysterical-edged laughter as she opened her eyes to see his resolute expression. She shook her head more. A cloud passed by and the breeze caused her internal chilled horror to be reflected on the wet skin of her exposed neck and lower arms. Cold hackle-haunting points of instinctual fear rose up, the eerie opposite of a blush. His hands went to her shoulders as he tried to pull her closer but she moved to brace herself against his chest. Once her fingertips contacted his skin she remembered venom and clawed her hands, nail tips curled in against scale, afraid that it would watercolor-wash away her instinct and reason.

“You ask how could I do ‘this.’ She is not a ‘this.’ She is a her.”

She let out another pained noise, specificity of gender and personalization of doom driving the glass in deeper.

“She will have red hair, green eyes, silver and black scale as were my colors at birth.”

Her hands then flexed and her nails dug into him until she felt blood. He didn’t move.

“I have not chosen a name for her, something I wished to do with you.”

Tears streaming, she accelerated her head shaking and spat “How do you say ‘reckless’ in Drell?”

He said with truth-shot humor laced with adoration “Cara Fanning.”

His tone stung like acid in the open wound and lightning-strike angry accusation poured out of her before it had solidified into anything coherent. She was suddenly viscerally furious at who Thane and Limayeth had been together, their arrogant certainty. This was hardly the only life they had ruined as collateral damage. They had risked destroying the galaxy in a conflagrating chain reaction to report on a fashion choice. THEY were her enemies suddenly and she had to protect HER daughter from their plans. “She’s a Reaper. That… thing… on the Citadel… could detect her presence because you made her with Reaper-derived technology. Everything you told me you avoided with me, everything you said about deliberate isolation from Reaper technology to protect me - you didn’t do that with her. You put her at risk knowingly. She could come directly under its control. That thing… It could… switch her on. It could see through her eyes. She’s… she’s a… a… potential camera. A potential spy! She could show it exactly what you’re doing.”

“Yes. There was no other way to create her.”

She formed blood-smeared fists and crumpled forward, her forehead to her trembling hands. He drew her in, arms coming around her as she sobbed. “You knew…”

“Yes.”

“WHY?!”

“Tell me why, Seleia. Think it through.”

“Didn’t SHE think it through? Don’t you already know?”

“Drala'tem never imagined you, Seleia. Insight into how much I could potentially love you and want to create a child made of your eyes and our ‘now’ did not occur to her. We were pieces upon her board and she had to postulate the ideal outcome. For her that never included children. I believe she was wrong and the unforeseen end game is upon us. I must choose what I believe leads to greatest Rightness.”

“For you or for the galaxy?!“

“For us all, Seleia. Hope is ever evolving.”

“So she never anticipated this, gave no directive…”

“No. Neither did I. She made her judgment about our potential children alone. You must have love, faith and courage. Your instinct when asked was imbued with those gifts. Seleia, this is not her plan or prophecy come to pass. This is ours. I told you that being unscarred has value. I believe that motherhood is also of value and that what you see as risk is outweighed by reward that will benefit not only us but your instincts and understanding at Synthesis.”

“We could have done this AFTER…”

“Then it would be too late. You need to experience care of the vulnerable yourself before you attempt to Judge it for all.”

Her shoulders fell and she was more horrified than her life had prepared her to be. “This is a LESSON?”

“This is a choice.”

“Not making this particular choice would have ensured NO risk.”

“It would have risked ignorance on a vital subject. It would have favored hesitation and doubt over full commitment. I would be robbing the future of your potential maturity and confidence. Beyond her as ‘problem’ she is our daughter; helpless, blameless, innocent, unique and deserving of our dedication and courage. When I asked you to join your life with mine, you did not understand because you must commit in order to understand certain things. You said you had done nothing to earn my love. You wanted me. You want her. We will protect her and each other. You cannot carry doubt into Synthesis.”

“If I’m imbued with not only your understanding but all of the information of all life forms at Synthesis, that’s enough experience then, isn’t it? That's what you’ve told me will happen; instantaneous integration of all available experience. Yes, I want her but I wasn't informed of the risks because YOU… wanted a baby on your terms and wouldn't risk me deferring. What if that… thing… takes our daughter?”

He didn’t argue her premise. “We will prevent that.”

“HOW?”

“Because the Catalyst once willingly granted Control to me. It has no interest in the future welfare of any creature, itself included. It has no concept of being threatened. It is waiting for the terms of its chosen prophecy to come to pass. It permitted the plans for the Crucible to exist cycle to cycle. She and I created a switch and power source that will bypass its participation. It does not know it has been made irrelevant. We need not negotiate with it.”

“And wouldn’t that... in itself… provoke it? THINK. Oh… AUGH. You are...you said... Aaaah…” She closed her eyes and the wildly swinging focus of her fears shifted and made her nauseated. She said in clipped fury “And if… it gave you Control to hurt Limayeth? That was its intent, wasn’t it? It is vile and spiteful and bored. You want to count on it remaining primarily bored when given the opportunity to control time travel AND spite both of us? When its death isn't by its own terms?”

He blinked, double. There was a long pause and then a conciliatory and vaguely shocked “I find myself surprised. That had not occurred to me.” On his face and in her mind was the reason why Drala’tem had never considered he would be reckless enough to attempt to have a child. 

She closed her eyes, shook her head again and said with horror-tinged certainty “And the words for ‘selfish’ in Drell?”

“Senar Tuelon.” He sounded uncharacteristically contrite at the oversight but added nothing further.

“Reckless and selfish are not a good combination.”

“I disagree, Seleia. It is an excellent combination when tempered with innovative genius. Reapers are not magic. They are technology. She will not attract notice.”

“You can’t be sure of that.”

“No, but the risks are minimal.”

“You KNOW what that thing is like? Or you think you know?”

“I know the technology and the agents that oversaw the policies it established. The Catalyst treated Reaping as means to an end, never killing anyone personally, idealistically preaching peace when mortals could still access it as a God. I have no record of its direct thoughts, but its sermons and directives are available. I would know if it had issued orders itself or intervened in set priorities and policies that persisted unchanged since the origin of the cycles. Imagine it as a game creator. It set the maze and rules, it never played or grew curious about mortal viewpoints or motivations. That was beneath its image of self as detached and impartial Judge. It represented the will to bring about the annihilation of itself and all others based upon cold, cruel and unchanging circumstances. It was the creator of a spinning blade intended to ‘test’ all wood for weakness. Despite its sermons and attempts to portray itself as ultimately altruistic, it exhibited the actions of a creature that designed and enacted horror without compassion or analysis.”

“It MADE the technology, so it’s exceptional, like you, with an unknown capacity. OUR DAUGHTER… is a Reaper, the Catalyst can remotely detect and switch her on… or OFF. How could you put her at that risk?”

“I will know every molecule of her moments. I embody technology superior to what it can muster or even comprehend by orders of magnitude. It will potentially have remote access I can block. I will have direct access it does not understand. Technology underwent thirteen thousand years of improvement utilizing the greatest minds of each age, Limayeth’s mind and all the efforts of the platforms available to Control. I would never allow our daughter to be taken. Embrace this as an opportunity to experience the world-changing and transformative fear and elation that is inherent to parenthood.”

“Most people don't have to contemplate the possibility that their baby is going to DESTROY THE GALAXY AND HISTORY AND THE FUTURE WITH IT.”

“She will not cause that.”

Her mind raced again and she said “You think it favors you. If it finds her, if it knows you, does that mean there is a possibility that it will give Control to you again preemptively before you flip your switch… putting you in charge and her directly under your Control and me bound to you forever, AGAIN… this time with a daughter I would never abandon and no outside dissent, like a Turian who would NEVER TAKE THIS RISK BECAUSE HE WASN’T CRAZY?!”

That made him laugh. The sound was not indulgently amused as it usually was but grudgingly surprised. She realized that so many of his expressions she hadn’t been able to read before now had to do not with new things he was experiencing, but reflected ‘Cara Fanning’ in any iteration. He looked tired and simultaneously impressed and there was a weary level of ‘She did it again’ deadpanning through his eyes and causing certain muscles to collapse. He was trying to manage dread and awe, fate and choice. He’d thought about a child potentially for thousands of years and in a day and a half she’d spun the intended joyous result from loving gold into blame-trampled straw. He shook his head. She was getting better at deciphering all the layers of his past and present and his future. It was endearing and infuriating simultaneously, that there was so much that concerned her that he was thinking but not saying. He drew in a deep breath and the half-rueful smile faded as he turned from the state of his life to the subject at hand “That is also very unlikely, Seleia, but now that you have postulated it, intriguing. I admit it would not be unwelcome at this exact moment, but I will not pursue that end. I would caution you against thinking Garrus Vakarian was incapable of crazy where she was involved. I believe bonding to her without her consent, which of course pressured her to honor his bond is a primary example. Who knows what the man would have done had she rejected his bond. I doubt he would have accepted it meekly.”

“Great, so he behaved badly, that justifies that you can? You’re using a proven tactic and to hell with the rest of history?”

“The tactic only works because you do in fact love me. I am not damning history. I am taking a risk that is justified by the potential benefits. We have the advantages of my understanding of the technology the Catalyst would use and of course time travel.”

“You would NEVER… allow time travel to erase the creation of your daughter.”

“You are correct. She is the Original and will remain so. I will not willingly travel back before yesterday unless there are cataclysmic consequences to be avoided. That moment will not be altered. You do not wish to alter that choice either. We will face the unknown together.”

“So, you just increased the risk from near zero to let's say ‘much more than zero,’ simultaneously shutting down escape routes and options. We’re locked in.”

“Yes.”

“You keep saying you need my mind, but you didn't warn me that she was a Reaper. IF you had, I might have said no. Definitely would have said no. On top of that, you exist outside the Catalyst’s maze only if it doesn't notice you. If it sees you using impossible technology while evading its tests, plotting to bypass it entirely, it WILL.. use her to get to you. It will be motivated and you don't know its true capabilities. You miscalculated because you want her so badly. You lied by intentional omission. You're in denial of how much danger she's in, how much her existence endangers the mission.” She blinked, hard, and said “No more time travel. At all.”

“I do not believe you should make that determination.”

“NO. MORE. TIME. TRAVEL. We can’t risk giving the Catalyst the opportunity to monitor that technology. Ever.”

“She will not be a witness to it. I cannot be used by Reapers to extract information. It is also near impossible they could remove you from my protection, but in theory, as an unaltered human, you would be vulnerable to interrogation. Therefore, you know the theory but you do not know critical functional details, as those details would be what they wanted and what I would require to reset time to prevent your abduction.”

“But it might… get… CURIOUS… for the first time in… forever.”

“True.”

“You’re… I don’t even have words.”

“A terrible person.”

“THAT.”

“You love me. You love her.”

“YES. AND… I am very angry at having those things used as leverage against me.”

“Seleia, please. You must believe me when I tell you that I asked out of need as your mate, not as a function of Synthesis. You cannot simultaneously accuse me of being too calculating and not calculating enough. Here, although it may appear in my answering your questions that motherhood is something we need, that is true but not the full truth. Fatherhood… with you… is something I need. I asked out of hope, Seleia, that is what you are to me.”

That was… lovely and a very pretty speech and it might even be true but she was nowhere near being willing to be redirected. “No. Time. Travel.”

He smiled at her and it was several things; loving, appreciative and uncompromising. He was also unwilling to be redirected. “Do nothing requiring time travel and I will do nothing to use it.”

“AUGH.”

“You will find that I occasionally do not follow orders, particularly if it places my wife or daughter at risk.”

“But you're fine putting us at preventable physical and psychological risk when you want something. Just like you did with Irikah, with Kolyat, with Limayeth...” Shivers and shudders, chilled skin, scrambled brain and the sudden churning life and inherent threat inside and out swamped her ability to speak. 

“Seleia, forgive me for creating and permitting this sudden shock. Your mind is your own, your fears are your own. Your comprehension is necessary. So is mine and I thank you for providing it, for your will to protect her. Your choice to bear our child was perhaps not fully educated in your eyes. Perhaps I did not highlight risks in full disclosure because I wished to provide you with an experience free of extraneous fear. Perhaps I miscalculated. I did not do it to trap you or take Control of her, or you through her. If your choice was not fully educated, neither are your fears. It is impossible to tell you everything I know, my Seleia. Yet I still choose to live each day and that is what you inspired me to do with that day. Because you asked me what I wanted. I do know what technology it has at its disposal. We are shielded here.”

Also very pretty and possibly true and that didn’t make her nausea better. Something was still nagging and she had to hold her territory. “We… were... shielded. Now she is a possible point of entry.”

“It does not care for new life. Until or unless she becomes practically useful she is of no concern to it.”

“It may care for impossible life. It could define ‘useful’ differently based on new evidence. The spontaneous sudden existence of a Drell-Human hybrid that is simultaneously a Reaper might be sufficient incentive to investigate.”

“An investigation that would lead nowhere. Her existence could have been caused by random genetic experimentation on current life forms facing indoctrination or unethical experimentation using stolen and disseminated technology. Regrettably common in any time period close to the Reaping threshold. She is not impossible as a genetic experiment, she is improbable. She will be unable to be triggered to transmit as this planet is shielded.”

“Making her and here MORE of a mystery. Then the Catalyst sends physical recon methods to observe or collect her.”

“They would not succeed. The inability to transmit could be caused by any number of atmospheric or environmental obstacles to such things. Direct perception is possible but it must be focused and I do not believe the Catalyst is a creature of focus. Reapers are a glacial bureaucracy of engineered slaves who follow orders. There is no sense of urgency or initiative, no ambition to develop assets. They focus upon racial indoctrination methods and causing chaos and division in current cultural structures. We are not important people in an important location. It would take time for them to develop or execute any plan to investigate her anomalous existence. We control time.”

“We did. Now it is a liability if the Catalyst gains control of it.”

“Seleia, that is impossible.”

She snarled “You're not imaginative or informed enough to make that determination. I can think of several possibilities. They send a patrol, you kill or redirect them, they keep coming. Sufficient surveillance of your activity gained by just getting a look at your face might be enough. Have you been active in impossible ways that could draw an analyst’s attention once they scan for you? On the Citadel? Where EVERY CAMERA is at its disposal in real time and archive?”

This time he paused, reluctant and distinctly alarmed concession tinging his answer “Yes.”

“Do you have a time travel array ON THE CITADEL?”

He hesitated and then said with even more alarm “Yes.”

She fell to her knees and threw up. “It might already be over.”

“Seleia, recall your Origami Ti irr’aq. We have proof of your success.”

“We HAD proof. Now you have overconfident, selfish arrogance.”

“That is perhaps all I have ever had. It has caused some concern.” His tone was self-deprecating but she was raw with anger and she couldn’t take it as anything other than manipulation. Before he’d said that Drala’tem had once threatened to kill him for offering to help her. She understood better why that wasn’t a one-sided story about Drala’tem being unreasonable. She hadn’t thought it was possible to be this angry. Perspective swapped and slid, and she suddenly thought of them as real people, not heroes or Gods, fallible and tragic and trying to save everyone anyway.

Wanting things for themselves that they couldn't get alone. 

She couldn’t swerve in that direction right now because a theory had formed like more broken glass under her feet. She flung her fears at him full speed. “You WERE shielded. She won't be. You placed an asset it could hijack with little effort deep inside its enemy’s territory. She could observe us, relay our conversations, revealing the possibility of time travel technology. It could infiltrate the lab with bugs. You of all people know how innovative and unstoppable creative bugging can be. If its identity is invested in the spinning blade it certainly would wish to use it on a likely log, that's part of its mandate. It might have let you run through its maze and win by its rules in the other timeline. It won’t let us invalidate its entire game without opposition. It could bait you into creating a time loop by using her to devise a catastrophe you would be compelled to erase, most likely by maiming herself or me, preferably both to create panic in you and herd you into the maze, toward the blade. It could watch you or me access data files, hacking then possible as an inside job by remote, difficult but not impossible and unstoppable once it gains access covertly. It could then learn by watching you operate the machinery, potentially alter the composition of your duplicated construct, send itself specs back in time. It could identify all assets in your network, adopt any new technology it chose, access your full libraries. It could then seize control of the lab by blitz while we were all out at a picnic. You’d notice but likely couldn't stop it soon enough. It could send any number of agents throughout time to take control. It could erase us entirely or only erase all evidence of its incursion. We’d come back home for story time and a nap, you'd never know it happened. It could leave you to your overconfident fatherhood until you attempted to flip your switch only to discover that it had been replaced with a prop. It could turn into a toy gun that displayed a red flag that said “BANG!” like an old cartoon. It could then make you watch as it killed me and claimed our daughter to be the new Harbinger. It might be able to Control you if it is inspired enough. If it couldn’t do that as you are, it could certainly use every bit of information you provided to it to newly indoctrinate you. Maybe you could design Reapers that look like us for it. It could know we have faith in the Ti irr’aq, that’s in your records and memory, so maybe it left one for us to be smug about.” 

She swore he looked paler. He should. She threw up. Again. 

She felt him stroking back her hair and she was too conflicted about too many things to do anything but dry heave. He said gently “It is perhaps unwise to say that I find your whimsically ruthless strategy alluring or to state that the Catalyst is not as attentive or meticulous as you are. But I have told you and obviously illustrated that I am an unwise man. Remember that its form of conquest is hideous, clumsy and obvious indoctrination by relatively crude means.”

“Which it could do to HER.” She had a sudden vision of an infant with metallic-blue eyes, exposed circuitry and a cold, knowing smile. Her stomach was empty but clenching, eyes closed tightly and tears streaming.

“Not with you to help me determine how to prevent it, Seleia. Hope is not lost. I need you. She needs you.”

She stayed there for a long time without moving. Then she shakily stood up with his help. She faced him, wiped her mouth and said: “Whatever Reaper-granted gyro-aided super balance you have I need you to not have it right now.”

He narrowed his eyes but did not argue and she did not have to explain. He held his arms out to the side in concession. 

She pushed him in the water and he floundered for dramatic effect, making it an oddly comedic, satisfying moment, reminiscent of childish games he had played with her, making her feel incongruously that he would be a great father. She grudgingly internally conceded his logical points and her potential overreaction and that he was and would be… a great father. She did not smile, but she felt better. He leaned on his elbows in the shallow water, lily-tangled and blowing bubbles as he slowly kicked.

She said “I hear pregnant women are moody. Get used to it.”

“I am used to it, Cara.”

“Raise my confidence level. Now.”

He lifted his head with a smile that made her heart pound “I love you and you are magnificent.” He went back to blowing bubbles. 

Her fury should have frozen him and the pond solid. “NOT ABOUT THAT.”

He shrugged and rose, obnoxiously vibrating the water off somehow, vapor rising, dry before he touched land. He stood before her and half-smiled in customary ‘I know something you don't know’ fashion. “Seleia, a camera would need a lens.”

She tilted her head “What does that mean?”

“You are correct that I have not considered everything. You are not correct that all is already lost or that loss is inevitable. Reaper state does begin at conception, but she has no senses yet. She cannot hear you. She cannot see me. The Catalyst might have the information that a few anomalous cells under its potential influence have come into existence, but that information is less than one grain of sand upon the myriad beaches of its neglected territory. Her cells as yet cannot record any experience and the Catalyst would gain no information by attempting to switch platforms to her perspective. She has no ‘perspective.’ She is as yet only in and of the dark, no knowledge of self or circumstance. You are correct, she is not a typical grain of sand. But the Catalyst is not vigilant, does not care, and considers all sand beneath its notice, one grain like any other.”

“You hope.”

“I do. I am also aware of the number of times the Catalyst took control of anyone throughout the cycles, including Drala'tem, who represented a direct threat and an easy, obvious target for years. Zero. As for the capability and science, Seleia, when she can hear, I will ensure she will hear nothing except your voice and mine on innocuous subjects, predominantly parental, something the Catalyst cares nothing about. Our wisest way forward is to be two people in love, dedicated to each other, to parenthood and to her. We can develop codes for conversation, encrypted code for you to do research on what looks like a normal Omni Tool with a translating eyepiece for you resembling mundane glasses. No audio will be suspicious and no translatable data transmitted. We will behave in front of her as we would in front of your parents. She can sleep in darkness and silence and we can have more frank discussions then if necessary, but they should not be. It would be best to spend our time immersed in Communion, to not speak of the past but to live now. There is in many ways nothing more to be said about Synthesis important enough to place her at risk. I will know if she has been targeted long before any potential hijacking, I promise you. I know how to detect indoctrinated Reaper agents and their technology. No vessel or individual from this time frame could land without me being aware. I could use molecular alteration to protect her from any incursion. If she is targeted I will tell you and we will move to Synthesis immediately. By the time she can see my face, any possible evidence of my presence on the Citadel or elsewhere will be eradicated from the Catalyst’s records and the time array on the Citadel removed. I can do that remotely. That will minimize the already small risk that the Catalyst will take any interest in her or me by extension. She will not be able to transmit or she will transmit the strategically innocuous and I should be able to detect and prevent any physical or observational incursion possible with Reaper technology at this point in time.”

“You SURE you can do that?”

“I will do that.”

“No time travel.”

“None necessary to execute that plan. I would prefer to avoid it for my own reasons. I wish to remain myself and not be obliterated. I will not leave you or her. I no longer consent to being a potentially duplicated construct carrying out a mission. I am a man with a future and a family. I thank Drala'tem and the man who followed her orders for their service and sacrifice, but you and I and our daughter will now live in only one possible direction, each moment too precious to erase or forget unless that moment means we would be at risk of being erased from time otherwise. I wish our history to be the one that endures. I know Reaper record keeping locations, software, hardware and protocols and I have the technology to alter them without being detected. I will watch for any directive that concerns her and if none are generated within five months I will submit evidence of her having been investigated and deemed anomalous but trivial with a do-not-need-to-know classification and a recommendation to re-evaluate when a reminder is generated in five years. Time travel may be necessary and I will not promise to not use it, but the odds that I will use it are as low as the odds of her attracting the Catalyst’s lasting attention.”

“She won’t be a witness?”

“To anything other than her parents and grandparents adoring her, no.”

“We can’t bring her to the lab.”

“We can. I can alter her perceptions of the experience or any potential transmission. She will be in no distress. She will hear nothing actionable, she will see nothing identifiable. I can also simply make it appear that her eyes are closed more often than they are.”

“And how… do we explain her to my parents?”

“We will tell them we engaged the services of a Salarian geneticist and we did not wish to announce it until we were certain of her viability. I can create the records of that visit.”

“So, you want me to lie to my parents and my daughter.”

“As will I. As I have for your lifetime. For their protection. As my lie of omission attempted to protect you from unnecessary fear. But the fear was necessary and I apologize for underestimating your capacity and agency. I did not do it out of malice. I am adapting to change, to your involvement in the mission, to your transition from being my charge to being my partner. Although I am proposing camouflage as a tactic, the same habitual camouflage that just backfired spectacularly, please understand my intention is to contain risk and protect our family. They will hold no value to the Catalyst as hijackable resources or information sources if they hold no power or data. If we preserve time travel as an unknown option, it can always be used to prevent incursion and initiate Synthesis earlier in the timeline.”

She thought and considered his solemn face, time-loop paradox fears settling somewhat “Okay. We need to get to Synthesis before she’s born.”

“No, Seleia.”

“Yes.”

“No. She will be born and I require one year of her life before she is given over to the future.”

“NO.”

“This is not a negotiation.”

“No, it’s an ORDER.”

“One I will not follow.”

“Where… is the switch?”

“I believe it is best that you not know at this point. For security of course.”

“Of course.”

“Have faith, Seleia.”

“I don’t have a choice.”

“Of course you do. But not having faith would be the wrong one to make.”

She stared at him. The nightmare wings had flown away at his reassurances and were roosting like bats in a distant cave. She was still terrified but not nauseated. Maybe that was morning sickness. In the afternoon.

He tilted his head to the side, his smile understanding and although she shouldn’t feel comforted, she was. She nervelessly stood there as he adjusted the blanket around her and lifted her in his arms.

She muttered “What, no vibratey-not-wet for me?”

“There are many disadvantages to needing to appear completely normal, Seleia, that is one of them. We will not flaunt our miracles under the open sky. We created a risk and a hope, we will bear the burden and blessing. We are a Drell and a human, newly married, and if you push me into the water again as is your right I promise to stay authentically wet. The planet is shielded from transmission, but we will not risk the possibility of attracting further curiosity. I cannot promise that a colonist’s snapshot of us would not generate potential data to be gathered. The risk is small but I will do my best to make the risk as close to zero as possible. I will honor your will to be discreet and unseen to protect her. We are going home, you are taking a hot bath, we will talk and you will understand. Grant me time, love.” He paused and the way he said the next word almost broke her heart in its raw appeal stripped of any urbane reassurance or deflection. “Please.”

She couldn’t come to terms with her yelling and him begging, so she leaned her wet head against his shoulder without worrying about the leather for once, closed her eyes and said “So you have no idea what to do with me when I’m pregnant, do you, cellularly? No practice? Afraid you’re going to suddenly make me not-pregnant because you made me ‘optimal’ and pregnancy is more about ‘chaotic’?”

He kissed the top of her head. “I admit it is more of a challenge than anticipated.”

She realized it had to be insanely complicated. He might have decided their daughter's DNA thousands of years ago, but he didn't have any information on how the genetically impossible hybrid child he was raising molecule by molecule with Drell genteel anxious hope interacted with his human wife… and he wanted her to experience real pregnancy as part of motherhood. He was winging it. She started to laugh. He collected his harvested fruit. She laughed and cried all the way back home, developed hiccups and sobs. She didn’t stop until she was underground and faith-safe-shielded from the open sky. He had begged her forgiveness but wouldn't follow her orders. If he were really contrite, he’d have given her the switch while they could be sure a day and a half wasn't enough time for the Catalyst to figure out everything. She faced a year and nine months of potential terror and doubt. He still insisted it was all necessary but she didn't trust his decision. She wasn't SURE that she wasn't going to experience the horrific hijacking of their daughter and have him calmly claim that she had lacked not only experience but inherent capacity, loss of a child and betrayal of a mate was required in her tutelage. She didn't really think that was true. She thought he was horrified by his oversight but still wanted what he wanted and would defend and justify it convincingly. Was he right? Her mother had joked about farmers launching drones to spy on them. Now she feared microsatellites and transparent or biological-decoy bugs with the Catalyst much more capable than Senar imagined. 

She had spent her life begging for direct experience, was it unreasonable that this was the experience he chose? Was it wrong? 

No. Not wrong. Unknown and fearful, hopeful and immediate and terrifying but not wrong. He didn't talk and she was jump-scare exhausted. Her eyes drifted closed as he held her in the sigil-and-fire light, real-time Mindoir stars displayed. She knew now the sigils spelled out the words of his prayer and the fire never went out. He touched only her bared skin, which consisted of her hands and face. He hummed as he rocked her - them - in his arms, hot chocolate and cookies he’d made from the fruit he’d gathered offered in solemn, paced rhythm.

They didn’t talk.

She tried to understand.

She was too tired to understand.

She kissed him first when she couldn’t stand not kissing anymore. He didn’t ask her to bare her skin, didn’t ask anything. She felt he was trapped in his last word - ‘please’ - and in his choice to fail to disclose the risk resulting in her loss of faith, trust and security. 

He’d taken much bigger risks, ‘the galaxy is literally going to go to hell if you don’t choose correctly’ was, in fact, normal for him.

He’d tried to fix choosing incorrectly at a huge cost.

She hadn’t taken any risks, this one terrifying enough.

He hasn't set time back, hadn't changed her memory… had… raised her confidence level.

He was breathless and eyes-closed desperation and she knew it. He had apologized and begged, would not repeat it. Not out of pride, but because he thought he didn't deserve it, couldn't ask for it again. Because he wouldn't consider undoing his daughter for the galaxy’s sake or to appease her potentially empty fears after they’d devised a plan. Here he was maybe hoping he could soothe the savage pregnant beast somehow. 

He had made a mistake but the mistake wasn't in wanting a daughter. The mistake was that he had been alone for too long and a construct for too long, he'd been the architect of Time when he had wanted to live. 

To be real.

He wanted nine months of married joy and a year of his daughter’s life. 

Was that too much to ask considering how much he had given back, how much he had dedicated, how much time he had spent in empty tu’fira, his best moments potentially behind him?

She had asked him what he wanted. 

He wanted so much more than he had asked of her. He had hoped to pay the price of vigilance himself, appalled to be caught wanting 

He wanted to stay in the personal paradise he had crafted moment by moment and molecule by molecule. He wanted to be with the family he loved before they had choices that might not include him.

Would she punish him for being recklessly, selfishly romantic? He hadn’t hidden the fact that he was and always be that man if he had a choice. 

He had given her enough information to know the baby would be a Reaper. He had also asked her to trust him.

There were no absolutes, no guarantees, and he couldn’t change that for her as an adult, had only provided it when she was a child.

He might have disclosed the risks later, it might never have been a problem at all.

It might also have…

She didn’t want to think about that.

She’d said awful things about Irikah, about Kolyat, about Garrus…

True things.

She couldn't talk about it. He wouldn't if she wouldn't.

Cookies and hot chocolate were about all she could do without breaking something. Probably him. Again. 

She couldn't bear thirst in another and certainly not in him, a pond drenching hopefully the only consequence of his impulsive joyous decision to be himself, finally, and show her he loved her NOW… not then. 

He’d love her then too. 

She kissed him as he trembled the way he had before she’d asked him to marry her. 

No, she didn't ‘understand’ at all.

But she knew she loved him, knew he’d do everything for their daughter. That was precious and mysterious, fascinating and shimmering. It took up all the ‘now.'

She was wearing an obnoxiously bright and fluffy robe because it had looked silly and warm and she had been soul-cold and near crying when she had chosen it. The hands pulling it off the hanger belonged to a human candle knocked out of ensconced safety, cracked, cold wax spilled and scattered, flame gone, only smoke rising. He hadn't insisted on being with or near her in the tub and that had been appropriate, but so was this, wanting to take the symbolic armor off, time and hot chocolate and his eyes making her too warm to wear it. 

She shifted the peach-colored fluff off one shoulder and said “Hey.”

He opened tortured-hoping eyes but still couldn't speak to answer the potential knock-knock joke indicated by her banal prelude. He couldn't say ‘Hey what?’ and pretend he felt he had the right to shared lightness. 

She swallowed against more tears, but they still happened as she said: “Maybe we could name her Kariva.”

Their daughter already was the mysterious evolving influx of circumstance, matter and time, creating space that would dictate how they chose to move, spontaneous and chosen reality with hidden potentials for hope and danger. 

He gripped her face between his hands, the word repeated in a hope-streaked broken wish for forgiveness “Please.”

He was forgiven. She had faith. She was his Seleia, giving her dragon hope and territory to protect. 

Okay, so he was overconfident, selfish and arrogant. 

She was naive, ignorant and inexperienced.

She kissed him with the memories of chocolate and fruit on her tongue, dropped the dangers of the future and the past because that burden could weigh her down until she drowned. His guilt could choke him like Kepral's if she let that happen. 

Never. 

Let it all sink to the bottom of the pond and stay there. 

She murmured “Maybe we didn't get it just right, this ‘decide to have a baby' thing. But we will. And if you want, after Synthesis, we can come back here, you and me. Everyone else gets a heaven. We can too. We can make Reapers and time travel go away. You can ask a shy woman who loves you to be your wife, to bare her skin and bear our child and I promise… she wanted to, wants to, that will always be true. We can live them all. I don't want to leave. I don't think you do either. I know we have to, but we can come back to now, make it better.”

“Seleia, I want… everything with you. I crafted the best story that I could, but I want every story. I mourn each excluded possibility for its mysterious potential. When you become a Goddess, you will not be limited to experiencing one thing at a time before a new experience supplants it. You will know everything at once. ‘Now’ becomes every moment connected to every other moment, an ocean known for every wave and fin. You will not be limited to surfaces or a drop at a time. It will not be overwhelming because you will be able to know it all, keep it all, cherish the right and the power as a gift. You will want, as I do, for ‘ordinary’ to be appreciated as the equal and necessary partner of miracles. For darkness to be appreciated as the equal and necessary partner of light. Every life I was connected to carried its own stories and purposes. I knew them as self, lovers, family, knowing murderer and murdered simultaneously, all free of external judgment because there is an immediate and blind imperative inherent in being alive, a direction and a velocity. You will know. If you take it from me I will miss it, condemned to see the ocean again from the outside, to not be the water and everything in it, beautiful and basic and vast. Life and its expressions are simultaneously mundane and precious. I want to know every story with you, of you. To have only one set of perfect memories is to discard the imperfect, the pain, the struggle… and I cannot be that man. I know the beauty of diversity. To be everyone is to be compassion and perspective, to know motive and sensation as facts and not mysteries. I will always love Irikah and grieve for her. I should want to rescue her, but she was perfect and mundane, exalted and exactly who she was. I honor her place in time and space. If she wishes another story and you grant it I would want to know it, but not to erase her life, only to give her more life to live, more choices to cherish. I will always be Kolyat's failing father. I will always love Drala'tem for her defiance - ironically of me particularly. I will always love your parents as their friend. I will always love you as a father loves a daughter, as a man loves his mate, as a worshipper loves his Goddess. I will always love our daughter for her innocence and how much I wanted to look into her eyes and see her, see who she sees in me. Do not take any of that from me. Do not make me perfect. Tell me stories and yes, we can live new stories but never erase the old. Please, stay with me. Anywhere, everywhere. Let history and the future be beautiful and meaningful, broken or whole. I beg you Seleia, choose wisely in Synthesis and do not strip people of their circumstances or choices. My innocent six-year-old self has a Goddess to meet and miracles to explore, but I am not him. I do not wish to undo my pain and choices to be your image of who he should have been. I do not want to forget today or any day with you. Changing time has taught me that there was a child I loved who died suddenly in her sleep. She was glorious, as deserving as you to become a Goddess. She had a free laugh and a transcendent smile and a secret handshake she made up for us to use only when nobody else could see. She had ambitions to create a secret language only she and I would speak that she wanted to teach me. I miss her, she is gone, your smiles precious upon your rebirth but never the same, and we had no handshake. She was sacrificed to the mission, for your path, but I mourn the child that was. She deserves a future if she wants one, even another me. I would go to her but I would go as me, also having known you, today, our daughter and whatever else the ocean offers. I don't want you to forget today or now. I do not wish to go back, only ever forward. Grant me your love, our Communion, our Kariva, and afternoons arguing and making cookies.” He smiled and teased, a gentle finger along the border of her skin where it touched fabric “And this ridiculous robe half off your trembling shoulder as you cry. Please.”

She turned her head to kiss his palm and snuffled back tears loudly, for once not self-conscious at all, and maybe that shift in perspective was his goal, maybe it was good and necessary and it wasn't his fault that truth was painful and complicated. She met his eyes, voice trembling as she said in her now-perfect knock-knock voice that was precious and mundane “Tell you what. I’ll think about it. I’ve got some time and you've got more cookies. I’ll figure it out.” She felt the stirring of a direction that was newly fascinating, something about the handshake and how she wanted one now, but that inspiration belonged to another little girl and she shouldn't steal her idea and claim it. That belonged to them and she was an external witness, only able to be sad about their loss of each other, her loss and even jealousy of their ease and intimacy infusing her grief. That was the surface, the drop in the ocean. Drala’tem wanted to erase pain, but that would erase story and character. Something fizzed in her mind, his beseeching and living velocity and direction validated in valuing risk and reward. 

Drala'tem had known she wasn't the one to make that choice and she’d given her power away in a gesture of faith and love, both given to this man who was trying to teach all truths at once. 

So… give people capacity and control over their capacity? Will and choices as adjustable faucets, temperature and force of flow? Individual stories had to merge with the whole, the ocean valued and experienced? 

To be a camera one has to have a lens. 

Focus. 

Perspective.

Compassion. 

She promised, “I’ll consult an expert.” Then because she was human, that ambition was supplanted by the next moment as he felt all of it at once by choice. 

They had a Path and it was lit by her baring his skin, kissing him and having faith. She hadn't thought of a handshake. By four years old he had taught her some Drell calligraphy but what she had loved making were ripped-paper human-symbol hearts scribbled with the brightest red she could find. She had brought him hundreds of them. He had given her stacks of different types of paper until she found the sort that tore just right and pigment treasure in garish scarlet. She favored construction paper and she loved the smear and glide of pastel sticks and the hard lean she could put on crayon, sure she was making magic when she pressed so hard the crayon broke, saving the broken pieces as relics imbued with everything she was feeling, scribbling with them joyously, spending hours on distilled expressions of love that would be there with him to keep him company when she went home. She had brought him thousands of wildflower bouquets, all unrefined love in riotous blare that screamed ‘LOOK AT ME I LOVE YOU!’

Once his home had flowers from her in a vase she couldn't bear for them to not be there, bringing him new ones every day. Her father had a greenhouse dedicated to flowers because she got anxious in the winter that she wouldn't find anything. Her four-year-old self had haughtily insisted ‘Nar keep her hearts on his refrigerator because that's what humans did. He had until they faded and curled under tasteful, muted and refined Drell-art magnets in swirled sand sculpture that reassured her every time she saw them that he loved her too. She bet he still had them in a box somewhere, maybe now kept company by an Origami Ti irr’aq; sheltered treasures.

She had forgotten them until now. 

She wasn't ashamed of being ignorant or naive. 

He needed her. 

She let him be sorry and worried until he couldn't stand not kissing anymore either. 

The robe didn't come off soon or all at once, skin slowly revealed in about all the striptease she was ever going to manage. Okay, so it mostly came off through enthusiastic leaning on him. 

The goofy robe that he’d picked out for her because he knew fluffy things made her happy was perfectly ‘them’ and that's what they would be. 

So that's who they were. He wouldn't run for the Synthesis switch or tell her where it was, she was sure, and now she WANTED a year with their daughter and whatever else would make her want to shove him in the pond during that year. 

She was really looking forward to it. 

Her daughter had just been conceived, her husband had just declared it to be his first birthday and that time was now moving one way and no longer repeatable, precious in its uncertainty and spiced with fear like bitter Drell herbs he pulled from a drawer, explaining they were rare, expensive and not too much should be used, but they made a dish better. 

There was a lot to celebrate.

She was sure of it as he grew sure she was sure, his hum slowly transforming into his tease-sated growling. 

When he was certain he was forgiven her heart-colored and wildflower-infused human candle sparked and sprouted into free flame. Ti irr’aq growls began and she was alternately cradled like fragile treasure and then suddenly shoved into a newly inspired and desired position like a toy. He made her feel home, safe, loved, pinned to the moment’s needs, scribbled wildly, brushstroke cherished, heart-torn, leaned on until she broke into imbued-magic shards, healed, needed and wanted and then washed into watercolor blended Communion.


	9. Chapter 9

Senar’s tactical exposure from his Seleia's perspective reminded him of when he had failed to maintain stealth and been seen seconds before his seventh assassination. He had watched the startled and scrambling eyes of his target track his movement but not recognize him for what he was. Horror and wonder had swarmed through their expression like tentacles of speculative darkness lashing out. The Hanar had taught him not to look into the eyes of targets except when attempting to gather intelligence. According to his training, the Gods that ruled the souls of those chosen for holy death would recognize the assassin as an opponent and seek to drive them mad. Once those Gods saw a servant of Amonkira, the target’s words would become poisoned smoke not to be breathed in, their eyes portals to Divine curse not to be entered or entertained. 

His Seleia had warned him not to look in the eyes of his daughter for the same reasons. 

He could not tell her how or even if she was right or wrong. 

His seventh target, a drowsing, habitually intoxicated Asari merchant had frozen, possibly suspecting Senar was a hallucination. That had allowed a clean and quiet kill. Senar had made his prayer and thanked Amonkira for sparing him from death or madness. He had promised his service would exhibit greater skill and vigilance after this testing. 

The Hanar had not been wrong. In the eyes of targets was potential madness, opposing Gods metaphorically compelling but the least real risk. The Hanar wanted their politically-driven chosen competition to die without inspiring fascination or compassion in their weapons. 

The right to look into the eyes of his daughter was proving to be a necessary expression of catastrophic success he would not forego. 

The Hanar had chosen Senar to terminate other Drell assassins that had defied their handlers. He had not looked in their eyes. Witnessing their conspicuous chaotic consumption of life and power had been all he had wished to know of them. They had been the Drell equivalent of Ardat-Yakshi, pleasure-thrill-gain animals that had gone mad by heeding the wrong gods. They needed his solemn service and prayers but beyond that he had not troubled himself with their fate. 

He had already gone mad by the time he looked into the eyes of Irikah’s rapists, torturers and murderers. At the time he believed he had gone mad at the news if her death, but that was only the harvest of his insanity. The seeds had been planted long before, the crop wide and lush. He had stared into his prey’s pain-ravaged and mindless eyes, daring every God that demanded her death and sought to curse him to witness his wrath, to come and claim him if they could. 

Dying eyes were an intimate thing and a murderer could become humble when whatever horror-tossed scenario they created could not draw the victim from their own experience of death. He had asked questions and made statements regarding Irikah and nothing more, had not been mad enough to yell into the dying eyes that he demanded to see their Gods. It had been about her. Yet he was certain they had died not thinking of Irikah or even of Thane. They left life embracing whatever they valued in memory; the scent of their mother, the touch of a lover, the remembered bliss of drug addiction. Given enough time to lose hope of escape or relief, they all turned to their Drala'tem, whatever it was. After Control, knowing the fading thoughts of the dying directly, he had determined the Hanar had not been only metaphorically but literally right. Through the eyes of the condemned was a bridge to lost or imagined pleasures in every case. The Gods of Love, Forgiveness, Wealth and Power confronted the Gods of Indifference, Wrath, Loss and Helplessness in each taken life when the dying mind had time to comprehend. 

Perhaps murderers saw their own power at that moment, believing that connection belonged to them as they severed it. 

One more delusion inherent to those driven mad by their own Drala'tem and a ruling God. 

Perhaps those Gods had claimed his sanity, their curse creative beyond imagining and carrying with it the belief that the curse did not exist. 

Until Siha eyes claimed him as hers and demanded sanity of him. 

Now he was alive, in unpredicted territory, stealth failed, Path set, steps rationed and rare. 

He believed Amonkira would be proud of him. 

So would his Siha.

So, unfortunately and tangentially, would the Catalyst. 

He had never felt this elated. 

He had, in fact, risked destroying the entire galaxy’s timeline for the right to meet and raise his daughter. Their daughter.

The odds were much lower than his Seleia had sensed, but they had theoretically been possible. 

He had made them possible. 

Moving to Synthesis was the only way to eliminate further risk and find out if he had miscalculated already.

He was terrified, humiliated and adamant.

Who he was, who he wanted to be rushed through veins that had been chilled and regulated, now hot and so filled with pulsing promise that he was distracted by the false-true sound of the platform-perfect rendering of his roaring heartbeat in his ears. Hope and heat had flung previously-frozen doors wide open, metaphoric portals into idyllic landscaped beauty or roiling abyssal horror. 

He wanted them all and more.

He held his wife and daughter in his arms, safe and unsafe, trusting and untrusting, spectrums in conflict. She wanted him, she wanted Kariva, she wanted the future. She would have them. 

They had looked into each other’s eyes, Divine nature revealed, and had either not gone mad or had gone mad together. 

She was loving without any spectrum or struggle. 

His Manipar and daughter solidified from dream and potential into reality, lit his mind with swarming fireworks and immediate life. He lost himself in them gratefully.

Tomorrow would be soon enough to implement every security protocol they had posited.

He kissed the back of his Seleia’s neck, sweat-dampened hair on his lips, the scent of her altered from the cresting surges of creation, defiance and forgiveness. 

Sands, they were beautiful. He flung himself into the storm of heartbeat and sparks gratefully. 

He repeated his prayer, repeated his dedication to security - later - and cherished now.

 

+++++++++++++++++++++

 

Senar approvingly noted she did not speak of Synthesis. She had no more questions. Her unwillingness to ask anything was her suspicion and acceptance made whole. He need ask no questions of his own. 

She debated staying indoors or moving upstairs permanently, but he would not agree and he knew she did not wish to come to that conclusion. Much of her argument with him amounted to testing theories for flaws, advocating positions that would collapse when countered with adequate logic. It was as practiced as a physical spar. When she was adamant and unstoppable he knew it, her patterns as distinct as a tornado forming from dark cloud and descending like the wrath of Gods to the mortal and fragile ground. This in contrast was exploratory conjecture with hesitant weight behind it. He told her “Face risk with practicality. Our precautions reduce the threat to negligible. We would attract more attention if we were suddenly absent from Mindoir's social fabric. We love Sanctuary and should celebrate her gifts. The risks to your health due to being confined in terms of stress levels, Vitamin D formation, muscle atrophy and bone density loss are the only risks of concern.”

She said in a tone of distracted potential without a commitment to it “You can fix the physical and emotional stresses.”

“So can you, by going outside. You cannot control the social costs or the worry to your parents if we were to withdraw entirely. We have a grace period of an expected honeymoon, but we must re-engage with the community or risk more attention and prying. We should strive to achieve exactly the same level of attention and prying we experienced before our marriage to maintain a controlled status quo.”

She blew a strand of hair up in sharp frustration at social factors being brought into the equation, as though that were an unfair tactic on his part, but she conceded in satisfied relief and the question did not linger in her mind. 

Recorded surveillance of him on the Citadel was innocuous in character but certainly suggestive of potential time travel to have a distinct, similarly dressed Drell over a span of hundreds of years active on the Citadel and observable on the station through passive surveillance in public spaces without arrival or departure biometrics. He erased some recordings and changed some to resemble an Asari, providing her with a history and identifying biometrics to explain her travels. If he saw any flagged interest in her at all in Reaper communications he would know the anomalies of his patterns of travel or alteration of records had attracted notice. 

His assessment of the risk of mission failure was more comprehensive but his conclusion was the same; chance of failure minimal. Her assessment of Kariva providing corroborating information to Reapers that drew attention to him was valid and he altered those data points. He was not at risk and neither was the mission, but harm to his Seleia and his daughter were theoretically possible and he must prevent it. 

The main reason why he had discounted the Catalyst as a threat was because he did know its past behavior and current tools and methods. It would use them to develop any suspicion of ‘time travel.’

She had no doubt worked this out, which was why she had no storm of Goddess wrath. 

In short, the Catalyst’s servants would use the tools they had to hand, which Senar could access and monitor. In order to do physical harm forcing him to reset time, it would need to see Senar’s face and call in all forces immediately, in effect going all in before gathering evidence, tying anomalous behavior to time travel. Unlikely enough to grant Senar a right to his request for a year of his daughter’s life. 

Any curiosity on the Catalyst’s behalf would be procedural and Senar could control that procedure. His time arrays were not something that could be hijacked or reprogrammed as she had feared. Seleia knew very little about them by design. She likely imagined a booth and buttons. Removal of ‘the array’ from the Citadel involved teleportation of unrecognizable components that could resemble anything he wished. At the moment it was embedded in an inaccessible outer ornamental bulkhead that required little Keeper maintenance or scanning and was not scheduled to be replaced for 8000 years. 

Drala’tem would never have designed or permitted a booth and buttons with a helpful manual and controls that telegraphed ‘PRESS HERE FOR TIME TRAVEL’ in any language or code. Thirteen thousand years of technical development had produced wonders he did not display and could not be hijacked through mechanical, biometric or code ‘hacking’ in terms Seleia knew. 

Of course Drala'tem had focused upon security, but she had not been willing to stake the galaxy’s future and past on the historically foolish idea that a secret could not be overheard or observed. Or that Senar Tuelon would abide by all planning when unsupervised.

Just as he granted Seleia hints, so had his Drala'tem granted them to him. There were hard-coded and observable objectives, data collection and storage, reset protocols and no doubt AI override should he prove unreliable as a platform in his bid for redemption.

In short, should he fail to create a sufficiently inspiring Seleia, Drala'tem might have a module in the past watching, hooked into every move and choice, willing to Synthesize before the Reaping cycles began, erasing him entirely from the future.

She would and could do it. 

He achieved all objectives and supplemented her Path with his own flourishes but did not deviate.

He loved her more for her willingness to grant him his desire to incorporate himself into the choices of past and future but did not doubt she would unmake him if necessary.

Senar was the library, battery and switch, his will the only control access. He was a conduit to resources that would seem magical in scope and capability to his Seleia. He would not expose the technology to the air. He preferred to hold her as he slept rather than brief her on technology she would grasp at the blink of Synthesis. 

Security was not to be risked to assuage curiosity or garner trust. That was a directive from his Drala'tem's wisdom he agreed with. Seleia’s mortality was the weakest link by design and necessity. Time travel’s components could not be pried open and studied as she feared, but she could. 

He was networked to all arrays and they were primarily recording hubs and relay points, camouflaged and redundant, each easily removed if under threat remotely and reformed elsewhere spontaneously if needed. The technology was all-encompassing. He had hinted at it by explaining he embodied an energy field that behaved as manipulation source and recording, but he had not explained its scope or mechanics and would not. Ever. If Seleia chose to mistrust and oppose him he would be required to reset time or convince her otherwise - not with venom but with the weight of what he had already accomplished. 

He was attempting to blend Drala'tem's prophecy with his own, not betray either of them. 

He checked, again, decision trees and her concerns, his potential arrogance and selfishness against Drala'tem's insistence upon procedure and objective.

He could not be reprogrammed in any way, the only change in each platform was the data available. 

Or so he believed. He would be more cautious.

Brilliant as Seleia was, she lacked the sophistication and education to predict the network. 

If the Catalyst was listening in any way, so did they. 

He told himself that if he found evidence of the Catalyst moving toward investigating his Asari construct or Kariva, he would move toward Synthesis that day.

Fortunately or unfortunately, either reflecting his earned ability to be thorough or his demonstrated capacity for reckless romance, he did not believe he would. It would take a much more solid threat to pry him from his chosen Cave and Wellspring.

The need to openly claim time as his was sizzling in his blood. He was dangerously eager to look into the eyes of the Catalyst in order to declare unopposable ownership of history and the future. The Catalyst had held his Lasam and himself once in its merciless, mindless grip. No revenge could be as sweet as making it irrelevant except for it to look into his eyes and go mad first. 

He consoled himself that it was already mad and his Seleia would think less of him for wanting that taunting display. 

His Drala’tem would be appalled. She would blame herself for not having predicted the inevitable, regret sending him, palm over her eyes and muttering something about one particular Drell’s memory and Godhood not ensuring that one particular Drell actually learned anything.

He smiled, lips pressed together and his eyes closed in a wash of nostalgic grace, a moment’s prayer of wishing to be a better man projected forward and back in time.

It did not change the fact that he wanted to do it, but he consciously attempted to block all paths of direct confrontation after Seleia had made him aware that he had strategically courted it. 

Having his Seleia ask him what he wanted had opened the battered and bolted door to believing he could have a daughter. It had been too great of a temptation. Less than two years was still not enough time, but he could hope, did hope now, that his Seleia would keep him, forgive him, mark eternity with him. 

Security concerns did not take much of his time. What did take his time was a fascination with the state of motherhood. He had considered Drala’tem as mother but had known it would not be possible. He had not gathered any research on the subject, had been unprepared for Kariva’s arrival and therefore her Path of growth. He had been impulsive and perhaps compulsive because his Seleia had innocently provoked his surge of need and it had burst the dam of denial. He maintained two different spheres of dynamic life in Seleia and Kariva, able to access research about trimesters and hormonal levels, giving his Seleia the sense of being pregnant without pain or discomfort. She was appropriately and moderately pregnant, focused on experiencing it as a state of vibrant well-being and not chaos. Kariva was a challenge, but she grew day by day. He knew her starting genetics and her intended form at birth; a reflection of him, her and them. 

Synthesis was assured. 

His - their - daughter’s health was assured. The difficulty with that pronoun remained. He thought of Kariva as his because he had held her close to his heart for thousands of years as Drala'tem held her at a galactic distance. 

Drell memory was perfect, but as he had held those thousands of years of desire alone, the pronoun reflected past isolation. He was unprepared for the present promise, but that was why he needed at least the time he had demanded.

He had to see Kariva's real eyes at birth, see her discover smiling and laughing. He believed Seleia needed to see those things. Creating life was an anchor point to uncharted depths of a soul. The experience revealed faith, hope and fear on a new board, unfathomable and unknown internal territory until that moment. 

He had failed at being Kolyat's father, had only been able to acknowledge and feel the unfathomable fear. Seleia’s birth had been a mission, her childhood manicured as a bonsai, parenthood owned by the extraordinary humans who had created and nurtured her.

Kariva was a choice, free from Drala'tem's destiny, his chance to prove to Seleia, to himself, to his daughter, that this was the best ‘now’ he had to offer, that he was not tired of living, that he desperately wanted them. 

That he was inconveniently, perhaps terrifyingly romantic and no threat would change that.

That he was not, in the end, a ‘platform' but a man. 

Now was not about memory, but about faith. 

He felt as though he could finally breathe. Although the risk had been made immediate and fear had struck, that was paradoxically welcome in some ways.

It was not a rejection of his beloved Drala'tem, to whom he belonged, but proof that her extraordinary inspiration had taken root and grown.

His Seleia had been glorious enough to protect their daughter and the galaxy, again, from potential Reaping on the grandest scale.

They spent their days in more genuine bliss than he had ever experienced because the bliss was hers and shared with him. They indulged in simple things together, seeing the light in their life from the same specific prism, talking about art and history, eating food he had crafted by hand.

Whatever the future held, he had been loved, trusted and forgiven. 

His prayer had always spoken of the future, Drala'tem had always sought the future. He hoped with his actions to give her everything she deserved; freedom if she wanted it, a clear past and future and the ability to choose now for herself. 

He let her go and prayed to be chosen by her again, but if she did not, he loved her and sought to grant her everything. 

He found himself in the right place at the right time as the right man. 

He had no more ambitions, only thanks to offer. 

There is a soul. I sense her. I follow her. I lead her. I cherish her. I love her. The choices we made and will make together create the past and the future. We are Whole. To whatever Gods or Fate that have aided me in finding her, I give thanks. To my Seleia and all our moments, I give my best self, my best counsel, my love, Whole. To my daughter, I give the best of the past and the best of the future as her home. To my Drala'tem I grant my open hand, no longer grasping, at her service. To myself I give the right to seek the ever-evolving now. Whatever eyes hold threat, power and curse, I bear the strength and power to challenge them and to walk the Path, just as she did, does and will. 

Today they should announce to her parents that she was pregnant, a month into viability. Visits from a Salarian were on record, a ship and mystery established and gossip no doubt brewing. She was nervous about it. They had decided he would do the talking and she would do the joyous smiling. She had told him the joyous smiling part was easy, she couldn't stop lately. They were in bed and she was near to waking, the auroras of dreaming sleep fading and linear thought preparing to take the stage again.

These moments, each now was precious as he greeted her waking shifts with caresses and murmurs. 

The curve of her hip drew his hand to her warm, water-smooth skin. 

Her hair drew his lips and his breath in deeper. 

She spoke softly but with strength, only the volume low to show respect to the silence “Could we stay here today? Just one more day of her being our secret? Not because I'm afraid, but because I love this. Here. Us. You. Her. I want to celebrate. Please.”

Asking him to give her exactly what he wanted was a blend of triumph and surrender, blindness and clarity, an intimate and tailored gift she gave each day as prayer and miracle. 

“My Seleia…” He was unable to find words, all wrong. There was no word for something this solid and ephemeral at once. There was no phrase to capture and hold something this free and defiant. 

He shouldn’t try to capture it at all.

His muscles tensed, cock painfully hard, his heart crowded with demands that he recreate this moment as his eternity, a prayer to his future Seleia that if she had no more need of him but still had mercy, she could leave him here in time, to live this stolen-given-fated moment as his Shores. 

Biotic flare and blurred eyes, pained and jubilant tongue-tangled prayer gave her a scrambling, giggling moment to turn and press him back. Stunned into staring at her, she straddled his body, the inrush of lust strong and flowing into the ocean of all that made now. 

Her hair hung down in strands that teased his chest, her eyes capturing him in her crystalline prism and he was all colors of light and life at once. Her smile was maiden-mother-crone innocent, loving and wise. She comprehended all the words he could not find or speak. 

Her hips shifted, she moved to claim him and time, life and now as hers with her kiss, her deliberate brushstrokes of creation drawing him in, drawing her down. 

She murmured “That's a yes” against his lips, the syrup-sweet drenching of her smile heard in her words with his eyes closed.

Her hips again called his hands to them, she moved and he followed her where she led and she knew every word he might have to say.


	10. Chapter 10

Cara learned that bliss could be awkward. Senar had asked her if she wanted to have all pain relieved, all discomfort eased, but she didn't. She was a studious mother, every twinge of muscular pain or imbalance - emotional or physical - was a tiny-in-scope reminder of the fact that women had suffered and died for this, with this. They had been in turns hopeful and terrified, statistically historically helpless to control the outcome. They had all been caught in a storm of genetically necessary lottery. 

She was in the calm of genetically chosen destiny but she imagined and empathized, knowing this was the scent of smoke and not being burned at the stake.

Evolution had been neither wise nor intelligent, an expression of merciless, stark statistics.

All dice were loaded now, held in Senar’s calm and rolling palm, clicking to his rhythm and dropping only when he chose. 

She should be more upset at him for his power play, she imagined, but she wasn’t. It was hopefully not a failure of her imagination but an expansive lesson about what reality had been and was. There were limits to not only what risks he would allow her to take but to what risks he would be limited from taking.

She conceded to his wisdom and intelligence and hoped to not be a victim of merciless, stark statistics.

Pain control was assured but she’d have to ask for it and she didn’t always ask. He was pleased by her fortitude but frustrated by her wincing. She contemplated how jagged and grinding the teeth that tore at him were, opposed as jaws; the desire to protect and the need to prepare her. 

He had been through worse, certainly, but that did not necessarily make her pain a drop in an ocean of perspective. It seemed to be more weight, more straw on an urbane Drell camel who had a long-held grudge against her pain existing at all. 

Ironically, he wanted to preserve pain and memory but did not want her to bear it. 

Images of perfect princesses in stories, protected and pampered, switched back and forth in wobbly blur, veering from tales of controlling and overbearing mothers, fathers and mates to the look on his face that clearly illustrated her pain was an enemy he longed to quell each time she winced. 

Some women strove to be perfect princesses and loved every minute of it while others wanted to loosen their stays and slash apart the embroidery that was metaphorically choking them, run into the night and become a pirate. 

She’d been a perfect princess - metaphorically. She wasn't Limayeth or Drala'tem, blood-spattered and iron-willed… yet. 

She did and didn't know who she was, but she knew who she was to this one man and who she could be to their daughter.

It was enough. 

She would be the potential judge and owner of all past pain and blood splatter soon. 

His arms were always there to lean on or lift her and she felt connected to history through that too, family and love necessary not only for physical but emotional survival. 

Mom and dad were thrilled and bemused and that was the general tone of Sanctuary. “That's WONDERFUL news!” was followed by confused eyes moving from Drell to human and a curiosity-wonder hesitant questioning verbally or suppressed of “HOW?”

Senar handled the medical speak. It wasn't intentional in a strategic sense, but it was absolute that she and Senar were now a team and she was never alone in a room with curious Mindoir settlers or her bright-eyed mother. 

Her parents were joyous and unflappable. It occurred to Cara after the wedding that they didn't know Senar's age. Drell life expectancy was much shorter than human. They hadn't brought it up. She imagined her mother and father, loose-limbed and wit-sure discussing them, her mother asking “A baby, then? How does that happen?”

“I’d be happy to show you, love.”

“Think we could do it again?”

“We have a free bedroom. That's all we need, right?”

She imagined her mother's musical laughter “Well, when he dies in 40 years, the baby will be good company, yeah?”

“God, woman, you are morbid.”

“I’m curious.”

“You're trying to figure out what he's getting away with. Again.”

“Again. He’s good.”

“We’re hoping he’s greater good for everyone’s sake. If he’s better than you, there's a chance. He kept it up for 18 years, he can keep it up for at least 18 more. Admit it, you can't wait to see what, or who, happens.”

Her imaginary mother gambit-grinned in agreement and kissed him “I really can't. How often can one woman win the lottery?”

“I reckon she has won a few times at that.”

“Not her. Me.”

Cara’s awkwardness, pain and fluctuating state of understanding were treasured. It was like walking through an imagined museum of the human condition before embodying it.

Synthesis would make all helpless pain and awkwardness obsolete. Fluctuation, though, that was a key to a hope chest. 

She followed that idea into shimmering possibility.

She was the luckiest woman in history. 

Everyone would win the lottery as many times as they wanted. She'd make sure of it. 

In the meantime, Senar was so… happy… 

She wanted to keep that up too. 

She could.

She would. 

+++++

Kariva's birth was a red-black blur of sheeting, roiling pain that Senar watched and felt move through her body, contractions and screaming. 

She wanted it this way. 

He wanted her any way. 

She thrashed and screamed in his arms, enduring the pain as he murmured support but not relief. It was twined with having held his Lasam when she was in withdrawal, her pain tangential to him and taking all her attention.

“I’m here, Seleia. She will be here soon. The pain will pass. Thank you. Tell me when you have had enough.”

She endured hours, but in the end, he had to aid them both, physical contractions too much for hybrid bone and lungs, exhausted muscle and valiant heart. Her eyes were rolling, stomach tensed in bands that flexed and relaxed under his patient, waiting venom strokes. 

She panted, sweating with tangled, strangled shrieks and animal-brute shaded groans she tried to make human, but he could see and feel her frayed and fading reason give way to desperation in spinning vortices of sensation.

Their daughter was born in beauty of blood, trance in them all as he eased strained muscle, angles and curves. Seleia's relieved breaths came in new euphoric gasps as Kariva's first breath came, as she opened her eyes and he realized the still-rush of history and his future. Kariva was a new soul, Seleia was ever-evolving hope and he was the man he chose to be long ago with the family he had not foreseen despite all his power. 

+++++

Breastfeeding was out of the question. Drell were born with teeth and he kept it that way. Seleia's pain was not negotiable.

+++++

Cara considered Tolstoy’s quote from “Anna Karenina” - “Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

Motherhood was happy, deliriously so, her usual shyness entirely eclipsed by immersion in family, in community, in Kariva being passed around at picnics and dances, at the dances themselves in Senar’s arms.

She had no unhappiness to separate the moments in dark slashes.

She didn’t want any dark slashes.

She was one of the people that wanted the happy family option.

Was insisting on pain as a teaching mechanism necessary to all future experience? 

She considered much of human history and the options available. Most choices had been not much choice at all, but a necessity. When forced into necessity, the human mind tended to want to resolve the cognitive dissonance of the law of entropy into some level of ‘greater good.’ For instance, the harsh Darwinian ideal of needing to be ‘the most fit’ when ‘being fit’ was in fact unknown but became widely interpreted as ‘physically strong’ had produced an idealistic expectation of ‘the most strong’ being ideal - leaving the physically weaker to suffer as though suffering was what they had earned, not what they had ended up with when there were limited resources and the physically stronger had taken those resources not for survival, but for status. Human social structure had suffered under that philosophical yardstick and empathy became ‘against nature’ despite the reality that nature and social structures depended on it. Women dying in childbirth as common fact made it possible to develop a religious philosophy that considered pain in childbirth to be a punishment from God. These thoughts and assigned meaning gave mindless pain and loss a ranking system and a hierarchy, granting it some order. Order being preferable to entropy, these ideas persisted in order to grant the ugly truth a fig leaf of meaning. It might be correct that experiencing pain was necessary if one wanted to understand what being human was, same as one needed to have lungs that drew breath moment by moment.

It wouldn’t be necessary after Synthesis to be human. It would be available as a choice, but human pain would not be a prerequisite.

Just as there were some anthropologically-minded humans that reconstructed how to make arrowheads by knapping stone or recreating architecture from the tools available at the chosen time period, she could leave that open for people as well.

She was not only human, but one immersed in games, and she foresaw some problems with ‘ranking’ if a highly competitive human chose to master trials of pain and then consider themselves superior to other humans. That would be another ordered, comforting system of ‘most fit’ being predetermined and therefore ordained as a simple test or trial. Let them feel that way and develop their own meaning. They could have it. The main restriction would be that they wouldn’t be able to enforce it on others.

Everyone could develop their own meaning, their own currency, their own ranking or trial or lack thereof.

She considered historical unhappiness and pain, Voltaire’s “Candide” and his parody of “The Best Of All Possible Worlds” and how much cognitive dissonance it must take to take a look at human history and think that disease and suffering existed for good reasons. Whenever she heard someone say “Everything happens for a reason” with some attempt at wise-consoling uncomfortable authority that seemed spiritual but was more akin to numb panic, she had often said out loud “Yes, but what if that reason’s really stupid?” when she had been younger. Now she answered with an answering wise-consoling nod without the panic and let it pass.

What was she going to do for the people that were inherently non-consent? Wasn’t she taking their free will by forcing them into a system that only honored consent?

She had more thinking to do.

She’d focused on reading classics after Senar’s ultimatum of Synthesis timing, not needing any high-tech research camouflage or strategy. She allowed Senar to manage all the technology and history and she focused on theory. 

She’d think about it later.

Right now, there were the Haugens to greet, congratulations to accept, grateful smiles to express, a newly-created fruit juice herb-infused something Senar had pressed into her hand and a dance floor to appreciate.

+++++

Senar watched and listened, leaning on an elbow. His Seleia, Kariva and he were enjoying a picnic at the pond, Kariva’s tiny fist wrapped around his thumb as Seleia adjusted a flower crown on her head and continued to read from a selection of Drell children’s stories to their daughter, enacting the voices of the fable “The Tree and the Shade” - a conversation between a tree trying to talk a baryat - comparable to a monkey - out of eating its fruit as the baryat climbed the trunk by stages, telling the tree that it only wanted to look because the fruit was so beautiful, then telling the tree it only wanted to protect the fruit because it was so precious, etc. Seleia paused in the narrative and grinned at their daughter “Difficult problem, isn’t it Kari? The tree worked hard for that fruit, but it’s intended to be eaten. It’s biological bait, really.”

Senar said, “Drell were not particularly enamored with biology in their children’s stories.”

“Well, I like the baryat. Resourceful.”

“And lying.”

“Lying so very much. But also, very hungry. Bonus: He’s able to carry on a decent conversation. I bet that fruit was beautiful, and if he could, he would protect it, but the fruit would rot if he tried. He has to grab it while he can, while it’s ripe. He’s HUNGRY. Just like you get, Kari.”

Kariva was looking back and forth between them, too young at five months to know that this wasn’t part of the story. Seleia often explained all text and subtext, then made up new text. Kariva’s hand tightened on his finger and she smiled at them both, his breath afterward coming in reflexive stutters from the power her smile had over him. He did not regulate it. 

He didn’t want to regulate anything right now.

His pretext of control, conditions and mission fell away.

He’d felt those bonds slowly loosening, not in stuttering breaths but in deeper breaths and stunning moments of watching his wife and daughter rub noses and experience the world with him. It was in Seleia’s happy chatter and Kariva’s dutiful listening, rapt and enchanted. It was in them both sleeping, in their soft, even breath as they smiled or looked solemn-peaceful with trust that was deep enough to carry to Mindoir’s magnetic core.

He’d been greedy for every moment, but now he was full to overflowing.

He stroked his thumb over Kariva’s with a half smile and half a tear, tugging on Seleia’s flower crown to set it right but not too right. It should be out of her eyes at least, more beautiful in its impromptu woven spontaneity than any crown forged of something hard and glittering. Seleia turned to flash a smile at him in thanks and her words of baryat appreciation faded. Her eyes stayed on him and she said “What’s wrong?” as he stared at her, etching a perfect moment into something that would not be hard and glittering.

He held onto his daughter’s hand and drew Seleia’s hand to his mouth, kissing the back. “Seleia, we should do it now.”

“Do… what, lunch?”

“No. Synthesis. Now. Or any moment you choose. Thank you for granting me the time I demanded. I want more, but I need nothing more. Neither do you.”

Seleia’s head tilted and her smile widened “You’re right. I don’t. And I’m eager. It’s not that I want this to end, far from it.”

“I know.” He understood. Suffering continued in the wider galaxy. Suffering she could end and had postponed ending for him. After she had become pregnant she had stopped watching news bulletins.

“And soon I’ll know. I don’t have a speech or anything. I know what I’m gonna do.”

“Then it will be done.”

“How?”

“Just ask me to begin.”

“Really? No secondary location? No last-minute adventure? Kariva’s not in danger?”

“No. No danger. No adventure. It can and will be done now. Tell me you’re ready and I’ll begin the sequence.”

Seleia leaned down to nuzzle at Kariva’s throat until she giggled. “Here we go, niblet! Daddy’s wrong, there’s going to be adventure. Only if you want it though. It’ll take you a little while to understand, but right now that’s true about alphabets also in your case. I’m so glad you’re going with us.”

He swallowed and stared, tears falling and breath harsh but sure. Seleia took Kariva’s other hand, sat cross-legged in front of him and leaned forward, saying “I’m glad you know it’s not goodbye.”

“I do not know that.”

“Yes, you do. You’re just contrary.”

“I am indeed.”

She kissed him and he closed his eyes, breathed in the air of home, Seleia’s mouth on his and his daughter’s hand in his, her babble-giggle making Seleia smile against his lips. “It’s not goodbye.”

“What is it, then?”

“You’ll see. I know what I’m going to do with everyone else, but with you, it’s going to go a little differently. You’re on the fast track, all exceptional. You know what’s happening, nobody else does. Everyone else will need a sort of orientation. You can jump right in, I hope. At first, for you it’s going to work like a birthday wish. Since Kariva won’t blow out her first set of candles before Synthesis, you get to do it.”

“You want me to extinguish all light?”

She laughed and he smiled against her mouth. “Yes, I do, and you are so disrespectful of human things.”

“Extinguishing all light is metaphorically a terrible message for children, Seleia, why not assist children in lighting candles?”

“Because humans are weird.”

“Agreed.”

Her kiss deepened and her hand came to stroke his frill as she said “I love you. I want you to make a wish and blow out the candles.”

He did not have to think about what he wanted. He’d had thousands of years to decide.

His daughter’s hand tightened around his thumb, Seleia’s mouth on his was rich with murmurs of faith. The flower crown and her hair brushed against his skin.

The kiss built until he felt the twist of desire, of near panic, as he almost claimed his promised months but simultaneously had faith. 

He ended the past and she began the future, the familiar energy rush of the transformation of a galaxy the third most important thing that had happened today beyond a promise of no goodbye from his Goddess and his daughter’s smile.


	11. Chapter 11

Cara felt the energy expanding with her entwined, passing through every living thing and becoming not part of her but the encompassing whole of her.

When everything had expanded to the limits of the void and there was no further to go she embraced the boundary before rushing back in as she knew she would, bringing everything with her.

There was stillness and potential where consciousness was known and in its place.

She was Right.

It would all work the way she had imagined.

She took a time of contemplation that was not measured because time only existed for her. Everyone, everything and everywhen else was suspended in a chrysalis of data and potential.

Time began again without change and then she knew not only biological and synthetic life but the placement of every molecule through time.

Before she guided every potential for consciousness on their new Paths she refocused on the one place in space and time that qualified as exceptional, holding the two consciousnesses that relied on her to share their choices not as a Goddess but as a mother and a wife.

+++++

After the energy passed through Senar’s body, the kiss did not end.

That had been his wish.

Part of it.

He was elated, a hard pull of breath through his nose, his heart pounding. He whispered her name and his finger pressed on Kariva’s tiny fist.

Seleia whispered against his mouth “Happy Birthday.”

He closed his eyes tighter, huffing a dizzy laugh, whispering “Have I extinguished all light, Seleia?”

She pulled back a few inches and she looked the same except for more depth in her eyes that fascinated him.

“Yes and no. You were very clear about what you wanted.”

“And you obliged me?”

“With a few flourishes, yes.”

“Flourishes?”

“Yes. You’re special.”

“I am?”

“Yes, sir. The three of us are the only living things inhabiting the galaxy at this exact moment.”

“I am of course flattered. Will it remain that way?”

“No. I’m all powerful. It’s nice. There will be more living beings eventually. If they want to be. It’s up to them.”

“And I… am a simple Drell?”

“Yes. As you wanted. That can change any time, but I took the extra step of finding every molecule of the body you had when you first saw Cara Fanning and bringing them to right now, remaking you with them. You’re no longer a synthetic platform. You’re a man made of that moment. Short some Kepral’s and with some changes to your memory to accommodate you being you and also being mortal. You have an interface to the Library and all your memories. I’m assuming mom and dad will give consent to join us here, but who knows? They might long to live on Maui… IN a volcano. They can do that now. But since they could do both simultaneously, I bet we’ll see them. Hopefully, you like being you, me being me and us being us. I’m your Seleia. My management of the galaxy will exist separately from my existence with you. You know how that works. I exist everywhere and everywhen, but I wanted you to be the first witness to all of the new creation, the first to ask questions, the first to make new choices, the first to choose your desired fate and chance, love and duty.”

In the spirit of lack of restraint and being the Chosen of his Goddess, he trembled and looked at her smile, considered her gifts. She had made him Real, Unique, Loved and a Witness to the Sands sculpted by his beloved. Words would not form and were unnecessary. He nodded. 

Her smile was gentle and her eyes held the measure of everything as she suggested “I can explain it all to you if you want. She needs a nap. How about we go home and have lunch?”

“Home?”

“Still the same. Make any changes you want.”

He sat in shock. Seleia smiled and changed her focus to Kariva. He had made small fanciful animals from fruit and a gel binder for her, human and Drell mythological and real forms. One bunny animated and hopped over the blanket to Kariva as she cooed and reached for it. It wiggled its nose and dodged her awkward grab until it hopped up to her mouth, waited patiently to be let inside with a twitching tail and Kariva accepted this new joy, grinning at her parents as she chewed.

Seleia lifted her as Senar gathered blankets in a trance that was rushing with real blood and the realization that he was made of the moments he cherished.

He had considered not asking questions, but his curiosity rose through the serene mist of possibility. He swallowed and asked “Am I a prisoner here?”

Seleia grinned at him as she began walking ahead, toward home “Being a prisoner is no longer technically possible except in very specific circumstances.”

“That does not answer the question.”

“Ah, but now I’m the keeper of answers that change each time you ask. Let me enjoy it.”

“Of course, Seleia. What are the specific circumstances?”

“When you don’t want a choice. When you choose to be a prisoner.”

“Have I chosen that?”

“Yes. Technically. You can change it. Don’t worry, I’m a benevolent warden. You want to be wanted enough to be kept prisoner. Kinda kinky, Senar, but I believe you have a right to it. I’ll take good care of you. I promise. It’s the type of imprisonment you can always opt out of by deciding you don’t want it.”

“I do not understand.”

“I know. There’s time. I promised you a wish. It’s your birthday. Go with it. Maybe tomorrow you’ll want something else. Endless wishes are available.”

“And if I simply wish to explore this one?”

“Then that’s what you’ll do. You’re physically real. So is she. So am I. So is Mindoir. Everyone, everywhen and everywhere else right now is suspended in time and as data in the library. We’re the first island of the new reality. Every potential consciousness needs to be educated so they can choose their forms, virtual or real. Not all physical locations will be utilized by consciousness or life, so much of the unutilized matter of the galaxy will be reallocated to provide energy sources to generate and maintain new simulations and realities that may or may not interface. You’re exceptional because you wanted it to be that way.”

“I must choose to be unexceptional in order to be so?”

“Yes.”

“And if I do not choose to be unexceptional or free?”

“Then you won’t be.”

“Does that not rob meaning from existence?”

“No, it means there’s a blank space you fill in with your own meaning.”

“Are you… blank?”

“No, I’ve filled in my own meaning.”

“Warden?”

“Wife and mother.”

It seemed that what rose through the mists of possibility was the radiant sun. “Thank you.”

“You are welcome.”

He was curious but had also chosen not to be with her as part of the Synthesis guiding consciousness, which had been his wish for many reasons. He contemplated ‘meaning’ as Kariva was murmured to, held, sung to and rocked until she slept.

Their home no longer needed to be underground. He did not wish to change it at the moment. He did not want any answers at the moment.

The moment changed as she turned to him after stroking Kariva’s hair back a final time. He did not care about the Library at the moment. He wanted answers from her mouth, service from her hands and he was smug about his imprisonment going so very well. He did, in fact, comprehend the gap between mortality and God or Goddesshood and had a great deal of practice with power imbalance. When she stepped close he tipped her chin up to gaze into her newly-certain and calm eyes. He teased “I imagined being slapped at least once as a symbolic gesture.”

“Did you? And was that something you wanted or something you feared?”

“I am not at all certain.”

“You’ll let me know when you are, won’t you?”

“Of course. Seleia, are you my prisoner?”

“No. That isn’t what I want.”

“Are you real or a simulation?”

“Those words don’t really matter anymore.”

“Of course they do. You have two separate states for each, virtual and physical, with consent paramount to each. What you mean is that I would not be able to tell the difference.”

“Perhaps.”

“Then I want you to tell me the truth.”

“I’m real. I can’t imagine a state where I would be induced to leave you without you demanding it. You can’t harm me and I don’t think you will want to ask me to consent to harm. There’s need, but no need for that.”

“What do I need, Seleia?”

“Today? Your wife and your daughter and to know you have every choice and you are free to make them. That you came first before all other things.”

He had no interest in the future because its meaning could be determined at any time. He closed his eyes, leaned down to kiss along her throat, the exquisite taste and scent of her making him dizzy, weak/strong and sure of what he wanted. He teased “And right now?”

She was not teasing as she said “Me. Here. Us.”

“You are so Right, my Seleia.” 

He lifted his Goddess in his now-real/virtual and wished for, fated arms. He sought the meaning that had arisen during what he had thought might be his last kiss; for desire to choose itself, to touch the warm, solid reality of love’s wellspring. Sensation was not that different from his platform, as he had chosen well how to feel real, but the meaning invested in each touch, each confirmed freckle as she bared her skin to him was overwhelming. He had not chosen Control.

She had chosen Him out of love or duty. She was right that in a way it no longer mattered because the potential blank space of meaning was heavy with past and future promise that weighed like gravity. He grew reassured with each freckle, each kiss, each murmur, sigh and whisper of skin against scale that brought him home to her, as meaning enriched experience. Each twinge of weakness in his muscles, ache of exertion and reality of having chosen something specific and shared drove him to passion being an end and a means.

He had her down in dizzy and blind lust on the bed soon, her hands held over her head, his kiss testing each taste of her, drawn deeper into the promise of her body. He would never know if she was a sex-doll representation left to entertain him. Desire did not detect any difference and ultimately no longer cared as he was swamped with it, maddened at not being able to know and gratified at how well his wish was manifested.

His hand tightened on her wrists as they twisted, his other hand rough and sure as he guided one of her legs around his hips, the other following suit and clasping around his back. Involuntary biotics streamed over his skin, no other perceptions or Control masking the purity of gasping, whimpering and her biting her lip as her head tilted back, his hand shifting to stroke at her clit with blue-racing scale and venom. He did not need to speak but he wanted to, rough and breath-haggard commands torn from his voice in bright strips in paced timing like the lashes of a whip.

She twitched and whimpered, his cock surging with hunger and need, teasing closer to her core, along her belly and down as he decided what he wanted now.

“Wrap your legs around me, Seleia.”

She did.

To mutual groans she shifted until he was mutually teased, entering a gasping, teasing inch and pulling back.

So much for wishes and light and symbolic anything. She was his. He was hers. This would be clear and permanent. He teased her with cock, words and variable biotics along her clit and his fingers sliding inside her and then withdrawing. He bit at her lip, telling her what was real.

“You are mine.”

“Yes.”

Breathing was glorious, pleasure/pain pounding of the limits of mortality searing in red-black waves of exertion.

“Only mine.”

“Yes.”

“Good, Seleia.”

He teased her until her cascade of desire arched her spine and brought her harsh whine and gasp, as he thrust inside as the spasms of her body drew him in deep and his hips sought her scream. His hand tightened, his teeth grazed the side of her throat and his cock found frenzy in gasping rhythm, his other hand lifting her from the bed as biotics crackled uncontrolled.

He tasted sweat and blood, his eyes unable to open as desire possessed him completely, blind and clenched, tightening and twisting, knowing the difference between ‘harm’ and ‘hurt’ and knowing he was potentially hurting her and that she would potentially revel in it as he did.

When he could no longer choose to delay coming, as she strained and whimpered and tightened her thighs and locked her feet, pressing and pulling him deeper he roared in the mindless light-sparking darkness of rushing pleasure and what felt like the edge of loss of consciousness.

That was possible now.

Everything was possible now.

He was exalted in being only himself, out of Control and voluntarily guarded by the woman he had tried and failed to guard. 

He let go of her wrists, collapsed on her trembling and fragile form for a moment before lifting his weight at least partially and taking her face between his hands and kissing her with murmurs of her name and that he loved her.

She murmured back that and more until his lids grew heavy, somnolent exhaustion spreading through every pleasure-saturated possibility. For the first time in what had seemed like an unmeasured eternity he fell asleep.


	12. Chapter 12

Drala’tem woke up, panicked and gasping.

A hand reached out to hers and she heard a voice - HIS voice - Garrus. “Hey, Virce. It’s okay.”

Virce. She hadn’t been that in… she looked at him, his blue eyes reading her face, smiling and saying gently “I know it might seem like that isn’t your name, but you’ll always be my Virce.”

They were sitting close together on a bench. It looked like a park on the Citadel.

Garrus squeezed her hand and released it. He looked at the trees surrounding them. “Before the Collector Base, I told you I wanted to bring you to places and hold your hand. We never got the chance. This was one of them.”

She stared at him.

He smiled at her and her heart hammered. She noticed a few things. Nobody else was here. She wasn’t glowing gold. He was. He was - SO HANDSOME.

“Few things up front. You did it. She did it. Synthesis. This is what happens after.”

“I… did it?”

“Time travel coup. It worked.”

Consulting her memory, moments ago Senar had kissed her, heartbreak and resolute mission on his face, in their mind. He had said “I love you, Drala'tem. I have faith. Wherever or whenever I am, you will be with me.” He had activated the array. She had expected a few potential things; an instant blink into nothingness, conflagrating dissolution of stable matter into plasma, for Senar’s remaining self to embrace her, to accept that they were the ones left behind, a split timeline with all her ambitions in unreachable hands. She had not expected to see Garrus. She probably wasn't seeing Garrus. She asked in panicked neutral dread that hopefully sounded accepting and curious “What happened?”

“Senar went back, found Cara 4.0. Her name’s Seleia. They got to Synthesis. There’s a story there, sure, but she doesn’t want you to worry about them right now. Right now, she’s worried about you.”

Indefinable horror and wonder hit simultaneously as she felt alone, isolated and free. Garrus was here. It couldn't really be him, but still, holding hands on the Citadel was better than, say, that plasma thing. She smiled at him and asked “And you’re… Worrier in Chief?”

He laughed “I am. She thought… said… you should see me first. Talk to me. Figure some things out.”

“I’m not glowing.”

“She didn’t know if you wanted to. You can if you want. You don’t have to if you don’t want. You’ll still always be my Virce, though. I’ve decided.”

“Garrus, I…”

He held up a hand “You. Yeah. You look like you're about to cry. You also look like you’re about to apologize for something. Hold off on those. She said you would have difficulty trusting that what you were experiencing was reality. It isn't reality, exactly, so technically you're right, but she said she was trying to help you adapt as quickly as possible to change, something you did for her. She is giving you an impossibly free mind and an impossible Garrus as proof of concept. You don't have to like or keep either of them, but she thought they were the best starting points of mind and matter she could provide. So, let me define what I am, what she thought you would need to know as soon as possible. Everything around you right now is a simulation we chose to try to make things as easy as we could for you. Think of it as a tutorial. All the choices she made as introduction can change if she got it wrong. She didn't know if you wanted to glow so she didn't manifest that. She thought you'd want to see me and she wanted my advice on how to help you, so she asked me to be here. If we were wrong, you can change things. I can change some things myself.”

The color of the flowers on the trees turned from light cherry-blossom pink to the color of her hair, then back. 

“This is a shared space at least temporarily. It will be yours but she taught me about it, told me about you. Not everything about you, just enough to know what she wants, which is to find out what you want. Think of it as a technical space. It’s a partition that’s created and maintained by her, a simulation that has an interface to the Library you and Senar created. She was able to expand on the Library at Synthesis in confusing ways I can't really explain, but it involves recording all things made of molecules, ever. She went back to the genesis of the galaxy and used a transformation device like the Crucible in order to record all potential creation; not just organic and synthetic. She recorded it all as it was and now we decide what will be. Each being can choose their virtual and manifested reality. I think this was your idea, so you probably understand it more than I do. So, for example, take Saren. He existed, everything happened the way it happened. The things that made him a being in space and time are recorded. Now Seleia can offer him his past and his future. To prevent paradox, she preserved the timeline in the Library and reality, everyone and everything lived and died exactly as it happened. Saren can now choose to know what he did or did not do. He can create a reality where he leads the Reapers to victory if he wants, but he’d have to get volunteers to join that reality that all consent to the terms of that reality, with Seleia aware of all contracts and agreements. She won't let someone consent to being ‘charging husk 96’ in someone else's reality if they don't understand what that means. She can create as many husk simulations as he wants, though, however he wants. He can even forget that he is in his own one-Turian show. He can believe it’s reality. He can own his past or decide he doesn't want to know and what he really wants to do is carve luck spires from eezo as a Volus. To maintain the timeline, Seleia can take ‘him’ out of the past and substitute a molecular copy who will play the part but will not experience the pain of being the historical version of ‘Saren.’ All of history can be duplicated without the original beings recalling their roles, which is certainly helpful for someone born into a world where they died at birth or shortly after in uncomprehending pain. So, if you want to talk to ‘Saren’ you can ask to do that through Seleia. They can choose to set all their experiences to confidential and not identify themselves, even to themselves. They can't make you forget them, but they can ask that you forget them and if you agree, Seleia removes all ‘Saren’ from your memory. They are now a simple eezo artisan. If they choose to reclaim their sense of ‘Saren’ at any point, they ask Seleia to release that information. Everyone throughout history right now is in their tutorial process. This is yours. If you decide to let me stay, you can grant permission and we can share a partition. I already agreed to being erased if she’s wrong about you wanting to see me. This tutorial attempt could be forgotten by both of us if you want and you can set different conditions that don't involve me if you’d like. I agreed to the possibility that you could say no after the fact. You decide whether or not I remember this conversation or if I’m informed by Seleia that you chose to not see me. Everyone else is on other partitions, no way for them to reach you except through Seleia by request and consent. You can make this conversation disappear entirely from your memory, but not Seleia’s library. She keeps everything but will honor everyone’s preferences for experience retention and settings. You have a rewind, a reset, a save, a restore, pause, options for selective amnesia with periodic reminders that you have amnesia if you want them. Everyone has the potential for multiple simulations or realities running isolated or networked along with creative control over anything on their core partition. Everything’s modular and adjustable. Do you want to be hungry? Keep it. Don’t want it? Take it out. Want less? Turn down the volume. Want more? Turn up the volume. It's a simulation. Our bodies aren’t really here. Being in a real body is now a choice Seleia wants everyone to make carefully. She doesn't want to put you back into a particular body as default or make you look a certain way. Synthesis should technically have made her decide what everyone gets, but she’s decided that everyone needs to decide for themselves and be able to renew and revise those decisions. Nobody’s limited to the body they originally inhabited or one body only. Choose none, one or possibly multiple platforms, networked or isolated. Right now, you're experiencing a simulation of the body you had when you were 24 years old, clear of physical injury but still all you. Seleia hoped you would be willing to experience this simulation as a familiar neutral point that will not feel comfortable but will feel authentic. Physical and mission alteration that changed ‘you’ based on choices you made happened after this point in time in your physical life. You have all your memories. She told me that was complicated. She told me to tell you there's nobody else in your head right now, not even her. She is recording everything, but that belongs to the Library and you, not her. You decide if you want to talk to her. She would like to talk to you, but getting a look at your head made her decide that you wouldn’t know what you wanted until you had new information. Synthesis only happened a few days ago in real time, but time is now relative in lots of ways. I expressed emphatically to Seleia that some of my choices included you. I’m another familiar if not comfortable - or remotely neutral - ideal you might be willing to accept as authentic.”

She smiled at that and admitted “I’m panicking and horrified. Not sure that is according to anyone's plan.”

“She could have intervened in your current mental state but she thought that would make you suspicious. She thought you’d been ‘managed’ enough. That was an ominous statement, but she clarified - she thought you’d driven yourself hard and it might take some time for your turbo momentum to wind down, but your starting point is turbo momentum for good reasons. She didn’t know if you wanted to spend the next year sleeping, screaming, laughing or petting kittens. She helpfully suggested she could arrange for any or all of that. The kittens could be deaf. She said something about the possibility of creating kittens that thrived on emotional turmoil as potential companions, but you might be disturbed by kittens that fed on chaos. She said you might also love them because of it. She seemed to get lost in some creative meta there, but her point was that almost anything she gave you would be perceived by you as manipulative. Then she said that choosing me was obviously manipulative, but in the way that a nurse in triage might manipulate someone unconscious and bleeding to death by giving them blood. She thought maybe you might be completely fine, what with ‘mission accomplished’ but that trust was key to that happening. She thought that you being kept calm artificially in any way would be unwelcome and might trigger more turbo momentum. She hopes you might see me being here as her trying to be helpful. She wants you to choose to be happy but she won’t make you do that and doesn’t want to appear as though she would or will. She said you’d managed yourself enough and she didn't want to start making choices for you. She told me she believed you might be able to process that better than vampire kittens that might feel starved once you felt better. Then she said the kittens could be adjusted to changing conditions, of course. Anyway, I was convinced she was you and that she cared more than I could fathom after that conversation. She paced, she muttered, she nearly genuflected and said your name in that whisper thing you do when the concept is big. She's in awe. Not that I blame her. She wanted me to use careful phrasing, to tell you that you’re who you were, nothing more and nothing less at the moment recordings of you were no longer available.”

The kitten conundrum was a good thought experiment. She imagined clamoring, upset kittens with red eyes and tiny scarlet nails not settling down until she read “Cyrano De Bergerac” and cried for an hour uncontrollably. Then they kneaded her with contented paws and purred, drowsing in the enveloping, rich tragedy. She could watch the red fade and recede from eyes and claws in fascination as they blinked and fell asleep in universal boneless-kitten contentment. If they dreamed of lapping up pain would that make her feel in like company as their ears twitched? Could she reset them after that, or embrace gratefully the opportunity to have cathartic and productive meltdowns to make them that happy? “So, I’m authentically terrified, grief-stricken and not me at all for lots of reasons?”

“I guess? I don’t know. I’m just saying what the lady told me to say.”

“Oh. Well. Thanks?”

“You’re welcome. Was she right? Should I be here? Or do you want to read about this instead?”

She smiled up at him, heart hammering painfully. “She was right.”

“Good.” He squeezed her hand again and didn't let go. She squeezed back. “I’m not who I was at 24 years old. This is me, everything I remembered, everything I lived, restored from the point of where the recording ended and then partway through Synthesis tutorial. Last thing I remembered, we were asleep at the farmhouse. Then I was having a chat with Seleia.”

Her mind was spinning on the ‘careful phrasing’ and it meant that Seleia had managed to untangle what was ‘her’ from what was ‘Senar’? She was horrified, elated, searching for Senar in her head and unable to find him. That was impossible, improbable and…

She missed him so much, couldn’t figure out how to function without her other half and her other Whole. He wasn’t here and she wasn’t glowing and she didn’t know what that meant at all. Communion was gone, Protheans were gone and it seemed Seleia had taken away presences that weren't ‘her.’

Were they her? How would she know or decide? She had no idea how to feel or who to be without the galaxy in her head demanding she fix it. She didn't know who to be or even if she wanted to be without Senar. 

Garrus looked at her, Worrier in Chief incarnate, and she said “I’m having the predicted operational difficulties, but I’m listening. Go on. What’s she like?”

He said, deadpan bland as he obviously thought Seleia wasn't the right topic to discuss, “She’s nice.”

“Oh.”

He started to laugh, the expression on his face saying clearly as voice, as Reverie, that navigating Cara-crazy was his Signpost of authentic, that this difficult conversation was familiar to him in tone and what he wanted to do. He looked so good, the lurching not-enough of herself wanting to surge toward him and also to hold back and run away, scared it wasn’t him and scared it was. She joined in the laughter, thinking being helplessly in love with him was so familiar and right that she wanted more and that it had to stop right now. Her jaw trembled and held back the words ‘Stop. Please. I can’t…’ She couldn’t say it looking at him.

He squeezed her hand and looked at the trees, thought for a moment and said “She’s… she’s you. Brilliant, driven, loving and way beyond my comprehension.”

He was too far away and too close, his profile too vulnerable and too strong. She asked him “Are you okay?”

He almost snorted in familiar chiding Turian expression, a complicated dip-twist to his mandibles that was as distinct as a human eye roll to an inside joke “I wondered how long it would take you to ask that question. Yes. I'm far better than okay. I'm thrilled, joyous, all that good stuff. I'm worried about you. The choices Limayeth and I made meant we were predisposed to accept paradise, accept love. We didn’t have to make any changes. We’re on a partition together - Sanctuary is our destination in reality. Separate tutorials lasted about two minutes, we both demanded to see the other, Seleia happily obliged. We’re not back in bodies there yet, but that is the plan. We’re customizing, having conversations like this, asking questions and formulating answers. We’re gathering family back to Sanctuary. We have no reason to leave. You're invited. We want to stay there, that’s our heaven. It’s an ideal base of operations for so many people and ideas. Seleia recommended people begin by recreating the familiar if the familiar was what they loved. Having so many choices is disorienting. To get a point of view, she suggested we choose one spot in our existing timeline and get comfortable with new possibilities. We agreed. We chose the moment everything ended as our beginning. We’d already been given all the resources and choices and advantages to build a life we loved, a family we adored and puzzles to solve. I kept on making better gadgets. She kept on making better everything. We’re happy there. Some realities might not need gadgets or have puzzles. I'm not clear on that entirely. Ours will, at least for a while. Although everything that came before might be known, what comes after is yet to be and there’s enough puzzle and potential there to embrace, as Liara might say, for Eternity. Limayeth is grilling Seleia on details and I have another platform with them. Limayeth knows I'm here. She wants to give you a hug and make you lunch and talk for a century or so and theoretically at that time you’ll stay. We don’t need lunch, but it is another familiar, loved thing. No rush on anything, no time limit, Synthesis offers eternity. Right now, there is no interaction in your body’s feedback. Modular settings - hunger, thirst, fatigue - are all stable. You choose if and when to start them. Test them in simulation, play with them in crafted reality or not, refine, immerse or detach. All up to you.”

She quickly thought a few questions and answers. They really did it or this was the Catalyst or Senar lulling her into belief. The concept of consent-based creation was sound. It would lead to networked realities. Doable through massive energy cost, but she had developed Synthesis-powered theories of harvesting and generating energy, left that information for Seleia in the library. She and Senar had not tested them to avoid creating a tool for Reapers in the past, but Seleia could do it. After a few days, time travel and the energy-harvesting theory, yes, this was all possible. All the potential was there. Simulations alone would have a trivial cost, physical realities need not be galaxy-sized until they evolved to include the visions of many. Even then, matter itself had a lot of empty space. Matter was precious and energy-rich. Given the molecular powerhouse inherent to… 

A brownie…

She loved Garrus so much it hurt like a tearing hole in her heart, blood pumping into the abyss because he wasn’t hers to… pump… okay, that was terrible. 

Anyway. Seleia could keep a lot of lights on and continuums going. 

She knew that brownie was in fact encased in crystal, on a plinth at the farmhouse. 

Looking at him she was proud, empty, jubilant, bereft.

She was too much and too little, as always. 

She had no support from Senar to keep her from spilling, bleeding into empty, cold space. She was who she had been; helplessly dependent on him for everything, experiencing constant, grieving imbalance when he wasn't with her. 

Garrus was looking at her and she didn't know how long she had been staring and barely remembered the last thing he had said, but went with the generic response of “Good,” hoping that was appropriate.

“Virce, I know…” He ducked his head and his voice choked up. He shook his head quickly and said “I know I don’t know a lot. But we thought we figured out some things. You let me know if we were right. If you’re having trouble thinking, let me think at you for a bit, you tell me what’s true, what you want to be true. I can’t ask Senar because he doesn’t want to talk to me. Seleia assured me it wasn’t out of hatred. His message through her is that he was only ever focused on her. You. Focusing on you is all he wishes to do with his time. His past is done, his deeds may be known, but any rivalry or clearing of air or reconciliation is not a concern he will choose. He will own it all, will not forget a moment of it, he loves me but I represent too much potential for negative association to bear an expectation of future friendship. Murder is no longer a viable option on either side, but he does not wish to burden his past or my future with an expectation of civility. To his mind we both have the women we love and we should focus on them. We were forced by circumstance to cooperate, he is choosing to end that potential not out of spite but to release us all from that necessity. I don't think he's wrong and I'm not going to try to change his mind. Limayeth... it took a while, a couple hundred years, but she did tell me everything she had been thinking before she was duplicated. Remember when customized Communion became possible? She and I were able to be together, guaranteed to be alone. Limayeth was afraid for a long while that Senar was watching everything, but he gave no indication of that after duplication and went out of his way to assure her that she was free of his need to fascinate or control her. He backed off so completely that it gave her whiplash. Well, she called it ‘necessary whiplash’ and I agree. She felt loved by Senar, but all pressure was off. He went from creepy God voyeur to solicitous God butler. She had a few theories she shared once we could speak in a way she considered to be secure after enough time had passed. She was guilty as hell, always. But...Communion meant sharing that burden with me, me sharing my burdens in return. We threw all our theories into a pile and picked a few. First, you guys seemed happy. Really happy.”

“We were.”

“Okay. We worried and we feared, but… Communion. Spirits, Virce, Communion was so beautiful that we couldn’t imagine that could come from someone who was a slave or harmed. It was pure love, but it wasn’t just you, it was him.”

“Yes.”

“So… she told me she consented to duplication not because she loved him beyond all measure - I mean, she said she did, but not necessarily romantically - but you… did it… and were willing to face potential eternal torture to protect me. She didn't think he was hurting you, but even if he was, you’d never say so and you'd make sure you looked like you were as happy as you looked. That we’d never be able to tell the difference unless Senar was the one to deliver the news that you were being tortured. You could be locked in a permanent hell and what we were seeing might not even be you, only a puppet platform he drove. She feared he had focused all his creepy voyeur on you, but also was adamant that you - she - had volunteered for that, and worse, and that you would not want to put us at risk, ever, for any reason, up to and including your life being creepy voyeur hell. She honored what you both chose to do and what she would have been willing to do in your place every day. She lived her best life, our best life, because she knew you bought it for her. For me.”

“Yes.”

“You didn’t really have a choice.”

“No, not really. Turns out I had even less of a choice than I thought, but I’ll get to that. I didn’t have a choice, any more than you had a choice to go with Russ.”

“Right. That. How can you tell someone who loves you that much that you won’t be with them when they know you could?”

“Right. And how could Senar ask you to sit down to dinner with him at your farmhouse now, at the same table with the woman he stole, a constant reminder of past pain? He can’t. You will always just want to be with her, possibly resenting every moment he gets of her attention. You couldn't tell Russ no. I couldn’t either, beyond all the other choices, that alone... Did you know that… when the choice came up?”

“Yes. I knew. I knew you wanted a certain thing and that certain thing was impossibly difficult, but you had to do it. I had learned something by that point. The biggest mistake of my life was at the Crucible. I should have let you go. I should have stopped Senar before he opened his mouth. Russ and I could have restrained him. I could have either gone with you or let you go. I should have backed you up.” She started to cry and he pulled her into his lap, his mouth plates to her hair and his voice hoarse “I’m so sorry, Cara.” 

Crying like this made her feel like she would fall, collapse forever, nothing and nobody to stop her from drowning in grief and guilt. Senar shutting certain circumstances out of his future made her realize with a chiseling crack through her foundation that there was no place for her anymore, except maybe at the Shores, along the beach, listening to waves alone. The tumbling apology that felt like what she owed him before saying ‘goodbye’ fell into the bleak silence “I’m sorry too. I’m so sorry. I didn’t let you anywhere near me, I couldn’t trust anybody, I wasn’t your bondmate anymore, I was the combined fury of Protheans and the mission… how could you trust me? I wasn't ‘me’ at all…”

“Shhh… It’s okay. It is. It’s over. It’s done. It’s been a long road, but now you don’t have to save anybody but yourself, okay?” She nodded, eyes tightly closed and lost in the need to be in his arms. There was nobody to save. She was a simulated echo of chaos and pain that should be terminated. “By the time you told me that it was up to me whether or not there would be duplicates, I didn’t understand, but I had faith. She told me you did it to protect me. I did it to make sure I didn't repeat the biggest mistake of my life. I did it to back you up.”

“You did. I know… Limayeth was happy with you.”

“She was. She is. She will be. I promise. And you… you saved everyone.”

“Just maybe not me. You did figure some things out, but there’s something you didn’t know. I was a Reaper.”

“You… what?!”

She pressed her lips together “I was a Reaper. I had been one since Cerberus put me back together. The Catalyst could have Controlled me at any point after that, then handed that potential to Senar. At the moment of Control, he knew everything about me and could have done anything to me. When you chose to be duplicated, you became one too. By the time he told me, which he did within hours of me joining him, every one of us was a Reaper. He didn’t want Limayeth to have to bear that information. He wanted me to know it was true, that he had the potential to control me but wanted to find a way to work together, to be Manipar. I agreed I didn't want her or you to know. After duplication, he left you guys alone, focused on me. You were Reapers but he said he chose to not eavesdrop. I believed him, but of course he had just informed me he could make me - her, you, Russ, potentially everyone under the Reaper technology umbrella - do or believe anything he wanted by an act of will or overwhelming force.”

He bowed his head and his eyes clenched tightly closed “And now I really… GET… why he doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“Well… not all of it. He also kept the original ‘me.’ He convinced me that making everyone into Reapers assured you wouldn't get sick, wouldn't die, that you were family and he loved all of us. True or not, it was best that I find a way to cooperate with him. He did it in part to protect everyone’s potential immortality, I believe that. In taking me, he knew nobody else would be able to tell the difference… but… I knew you'd see it as me being held hostage. I knew Limayeth would have to keep secret from you that I didn’t… really want to go but I had no choice. Or that I really did and Shepard got a chance to save everything and I owe that entirely to him and that’s worth more, literally, than anything and everything that has ever or will ever exist. I can't tell you what was real then or now, but I do know he wanted me to believe he loved me and he wanted me to believe he was telling the truth. He didn’t mistreat me. Or I don’t remember him mistreating me. I had anything and everything I wanted as long as those things didn’t involve… you… or freedom… or death. I chose to work with him. I didn't know how long that would last. He told me about the potential for Synthesis, that he was unendingly guilty for robbing me of that, that he wanted to give me the power and resources to fix it. But if you’d known you’d have wanted to kill him forever for taking BOTH of your bondmates as well as your autonomy and erasing your original bond. You… aren't the ‘original’ you. Senar gave him, with his bond erased, to Russ. You and Limayeth were the duplicates. Limayeth would have wanted to offer herself in trade… you’d both feel helpless rather than hopeful after making a difficult choice. I still wanted what I’d wanted - to protect you, to make sure that as a God he'd use his power as I would want him to use it. Yes, you wanted Russ, but even when I was dead, you didn't take that path. Senar always glowed, but it was for Shepard. I loved him, but… I know she told you, but she doesn't know how much ‘desire’ was about venom suggestion. He made me blissfully joyous, but I never knew what was real. I did the best I could. I did what I set out to do, protected you all and tried to save the galaxy… again… but I had to lie to you. I couldn't tell you, there wasn't anything anybody could do to stop him after the Crucible. I could take what he offered and try to make the galaxy a better place. That's what I chose, that's what I did. That’s what… he did. For me. Looking at the results, can you doubt that he meant it, every moment? Or that I could be doubting that you are you, that it all, every moment of that time, was a lie and still is? Telling you the truth as he told it to me at the time would have only ensured...”

“That everyone felt like they weren't real. Like you do now and have for...”

She thought that she wasn't real and shouldn't be real. “Yes. And now you want more forever to kill him in. I was the one that let it happen. I should have asked him to leave the crew after his surgery like you wanted me to.”

“Spirits, maybe. Maybe we’d all be dead then. He gave me… her… when he didn’t have to. He could have taken you and killed me and nobody could have stopped him. Listen, it doesn’t matter if I wasn’t the original or a Reaper. It never occurred to us either way. Limayeth and I were happy not because of originality but because we loved each other and we knew you loved us. Now it especially doesn’t matter because we’re all simulations and we can make whatever we want of our pasts or history.”

She was crying and she shrugged ferociously and shook it off her shoulders “Or you HAVE to say that because you’re afraid I’m going to throw you out and blow up this ‘partition’ with a suicide switch any second if you’re honest with me about how furious you are. He won’t talk to you for a reason. He’s scared to talk to me for a reason. He’s taking full advantage of remaining out of reach. For a reason. Maybe more reasons than we think. I'm guilty of lying, of manipulation, of risking destroying the galaxy in a plasma burst that was WAY more likely than I should have risked, but I couldn't lessen that risk… and I couldn't give up on something I had obsessed on for thousands of years.”

There had been at least a 17 percent chance of that. Unforgivable.

He didn’t try to argue because he was Garrus. He let those accusations pass as the tension in her shoulders rebuilt and trembled.

“Okay. ‘Trust issues’ doesn’t cover it. I get that. But it worked. Listen to me. Keep that number to yourself. Hell, Virce. Forget that number. Stop being willing to be tortured. Bury that fact and set your anxiety sliders down to ‘it's over.’ Yeah, I also get that you are afraid this is all another twisted, controlling lie. But if it’s a lie, give Senar and yourself credit for not incinerating all of us and the galaxy. I choose to believe he kept faith. Otherwise I would not be here, he could have crushed me eons ago. You both saved everyone and everything. There’s no reason for me to be here or for you to even have hope that I’m me if he was as bad as you feared. He made Russ and Ahrem happy. He gave us Sanctuary, Communion and every single one of our kids. Spirits, is there a word for wanting to punch someone and hug them at the same time?”

She smiled through trembling lips and said with stark love that felt raw and obscene when exposed to Garrus's clear blue eyes and as necessary as her own heartbeat “Senar.”

He laughed and held her tighter. She curled against him. “Okay, that leads to another of our conclusions. You stopped physically visiting after a few hundred years. You stayed in touch but kept your distance. He visited, but never glowed without you there, in God butler mode. We didn’t think that was because he was mistreating you. We thought he made you Communion-level happy and we thought that was genuine. But we also saw the way you looked at him occasionally. I would think “Spirits, she just looked at him the way Limayeth looked at our son Ketig after he nearly burned down half of the farmhouse.” or “She just looked at him the way Limayeth looked at Ketig after he hummed his baby daughter to sleep.” Earlier on you seemed hesitant, disoriented but happy. Later, you were decisive and sure, but still happy. Indulgent of him more than anything else. The way he looked at our kids… that’s why I’d want to hug him. I also get that he doesn't want my pity, understanding or forgiveness as much as he doesn't want condemnation. He’s embodying the advice I’m giving you now. Let it go. At the time, he desperately… wanted children. You never had them. We bet you guys stopped coming by because of that.”

“Yes, well, that and I was developing an alternative tech tree and time travel.”

“Also valid reasons. So, you spent thirteen thousand years raising a problem child and adoring him every moment, also wanting to shoot him on alternate seconds.”

“Definitely that.”

“Plus, you know, that whole ‘save everything’ endeavor.”

“Which I got done between the not-shooting and the adoration.”

“You did a good job, Virce. He did it. He grew up.”

“Yeah, he did. Unless, of course, this is a Communion-rigged illusion.”

“And there’s that thing about not trusting reality again.”

“Well, to be fair, it’s hard to trust. It’s probably a reason why he’s not the one here. Hard to imagine him being in charge and giving me… you.”

“Trust has never really been your thing. I don't think Senar or the Catalyst would be smart enough to give me to you. Only we’re that smart.”

“Maybe this is their 395,522nd try.”

“You're terrifying. I love you. Give me 395,523 tries to get it right. I will eventually. Give it time.”

“I think that’s what I did.” She felt proud suddenly, a flash of truth and accomplishment that stayed real and solid. 

“Yeah, Virce. Good job there.”

“Thanks.”

His arms closed around her tighter, he breathed in a way that sounded like a Turian sob and she thought that yeah, she wanted to cry for a year. She could feed a lot of vampire kittens. “He doesn't want to see me. Ever. He wants to see you. Now.”

“Did Seleia say that?”

“Yes. He would desperately like to speak to you, to see you, but he is aware you might not want that for yourself. He’s afraid you might feel you have to do it. You said it yourself. You already lived it. How could you tell him no if he’s saved the entire galaxy, past and future, for you?”

“I love him, I miss him, but I used him. I turned him into a God butler. I used his guilt, denied him family… I loved him, but I wasn't ‘me’ anymore. He told me he was saving Shepard’s mission… and he did. I became the mission and I sacrificed us both to that goal. Now he's proven himself and I… don't think he should have to see me again. They… created Synthesis. I'm a remnant time loop. I thought they would fall in love, free and clear.”

“They did.”

“How do you know?”

“Well, me being a tutorial, I’m free to release some information if you ask. It’s available the moment you ask the question. Senar has authorized an answer to any question on his behalf. Seleia has done the same. It’s just… there.”

“That’s smart. She’s… smart. I don’t… I have no idea how to not be confused or disoriented, but I’m happy for him, for her. He deserves… he deserves to be loved free and clear. Always did.”

“They had a daughter. She’s beautiful. She has your eyes.”

She knew what she looked like, Senar had chosen every molecule of her and… “Garrus, I don't have a place in this new reality. There are already two better versions of me to choose from.”

“No, Virce, there's diversity. There’s your chance to be loved free and clear. Maybe not with me, maybe not with him, but don't you want to see what you worked thousands of years to make possible?”

She did and she didn’t. She did and didn’t want Garrus here. She did and didn’t want ‘Seleia’ to be a thing. She did and didn't want to see Senar, potentially taking him away from his free-and-clear daughter and Manipar who was now Goddess of everything. Everyone already had someone else. She was a spare. “Is my other option vampire kittens? I can’t have you.”

He tilted his head “You could. How could I tell you no after you gave up everything for me?”

“Because you already have a me.”

“But she’s not you, Virce. I missed you, worried about you, all the time. Not hidden, not furtive. She did too. She wants to be sure that you can BE her, be with her, be with us. She wants me to ask you if you ever forgot about me and to not lie, she knows the answer.”

“I had to forget you. Well, I tried. He could hear every thought I had. I couldn’t…”

He flinched, the reminder making him want to kill Senar over and over again in fresh, inventive ways. She saw him struggling to take his own advice to let something go. “Right. Reaper. Spirits, Virce, I don’t know what to do with that.”

“Neither did I. I do know I wasn’t good at not remembering you. The harder I tried…”

“He could never get it out of his head or yours that you missed me.”

“And she picked you as my tutorial.”

“I think what we all want, Cara, and that includes Senar if he’s not here and didn’t convince Seleia to try to prove anything to you in particular… is to make sure you know that you’re respected, loved and that you have the right to decide what you want to do with the rest of your time before people start telling you what they want and need from you. I didn’t get the impression that Seleia is disappointed in him or that he’s in trouble with her. I know it could all be a referred lie, but wherever he is and whatever he is doing, she’s his focus now but you’re his Drala’tem and always will be. Limayeth wants to make sure you know you have the right to her life, to her memories, because they could have been yours. I want all of you I can get. I desperately want to keep you from considering yourself to be collateral damage. Seleia is equally determined that you, as the source of all good things that are possible now and always, have the right to claim or maybe kill, who knows, the man who saved everyone in your name and he wants you to know he’d agree to both, either or anything else. We’re all also equally aware that you might want to forget all of us and start over without so many doubts and so much pain. That you might just be tired of looking after all of us and now that your job’s over, maybe you want something, someone else. We don’t know. We’re all waiting for you to tell us, hoping that we get a chance to be a part of your future, whatever it is.”

“What if nobody wants anything? What if there’s nothing left to want?”

He started to laugh “Yeah, that’s not the problem. Not sure there is a problem to be had anymore. Seleia told me that a lot of people want to get to know the Communion lady.”

“Wait… WHAT?”

“You’re a fetish.”

“That’s… no. That’s terrible.”

“Which is why I’m not presenting you with the list of devotees and a suggested costume department to fulfill all possible fantasies. It is a looooong list, though.”

“WHAT?!”

He laughed and rocked her, mouth to her hair again “Spirits, I missed you.”

She struggled a little “WAIT… wait… if there are… simulations… how many times am I going to be simulated?!”

“Probably trillions.”

“Oh. Oh no.”

“Here’s how that works. Someone can send you a request through Seleia. There’s licensing.”

“WHAT?!”

“Everyone gets their own creative space. If, say, I had a creative space, and I wanted… say… you in it… I could ask you. You could consent. If I ask you and you say no, then I still have pathways, particularly in your case. Virce, your consciousness in tone has been experienced by trillions for thousands of years. You practically ARE the Library, your fingerprints on every book. You're the Patron Saint of Knowledge, Love and Communion. You’re acting like Seleia did it all. Everyone alive through history will know what you did as part of their tutorial. They could pull your emotional framework and put it into a woman that looked like you.”

“Or one with bigger breasts.”

He was really enjoying himself, laughing harder “That would be a mistake, but yes, they’re free to do it. I think the third option is to allow Seleia to customize an interface. Users would know they were not accessing the real you. Or maybe they can think they are, but you would never be consulted, involved or find out. You likely would never encounter them, particularly if you set your privacy high.”

“So, I’d never KNOW… I was a fetish?”

“Isn’t it better that way?”

“I… I have… I don’t know.”

“Kittens are looking better all the time, aren’t they?”

“Maybe. But that means… if I want a Garrus fetish…”

“I volunteer.”

“Thank you.” She snapped that irritably but he looked serious and she had needed him to say it, to mean it, and he did. “I… please. Stay with me. Help me. If this is Reaper Communion, I’m okay with it.” That was a huge lie, she wasn't letting go of any of her anxiety, clearly. 

“It’s your Communion, Virce.”

“Sounds like something a Reaper Communion salesman would say.”

“Really, really missed you. Proud of you.”

“I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to feel. You should go back to her, this is a bad idea.”

“Cara, for the first time in thousands of years… you don’t have to decide anything soon or permanently. Take it slow. Find the familiar, build some confidence in Synthesis, let the momentum spin itself out and see what you want then.”

“There’s nothing left to be.”

“There is. Be with me. Scream. Cry. Laugh. I’ll get you a kitten. I don’t want to go. Let me stay.”

“You belong to her.”

“Well, that is true but there is room for more truth. As far as she is concerned we both belong to her and we also belong to each other. I could have chosen not to see you. Limayeth could have asked me to not come here. I wanted to be here and she insisted. Senar could choose not to see you, to stay with his free-and-clear family. He hasn't.”

“And what if that's my tutorial? You're a library copy created by the Catalyst, who can still harness my brain if they keep me happy. I’ll think I’m helping people but I'm really in a pretty cage whistling happily while I churn out advanced Reaper tech.”

“Okay. That's a lot of momentum. Give it some time, okay? Look at it this way. You can… shut down, shut off, if you decide to. Seleia is afraid you will. Now I'm afraid you will. Don't lock me out to protect me or the galaxy again. You have other choices, you just need time to see them. You missed me, Cara. I can tell you want me to stay but you don't want that to be true and you don’t want to ask for something for yourself. So, focus on the fact that I’m real and I have things I want. I don't want to be locked out. I want to help. I want to be here, with you. I want to see what you decide.”

“Are you… a… simulation? There is no way for either of us to know according to the terms you’ve described. Maybe the Catalyst or Seleia know I can't tell you no but the real you has opted to forget I exist, assuming I’ll do the smart thing, stick to my agreements and sacrifice myself for galactic good.”

“Well first off, that doesn't sound like the real me at all, but you can be forgiven for not knowing him all that well. You never got the chance to tell him the truth and he never got the chance to hear it. Second off, yeah, I guess I could be a trap. But if I’m a Reaper Communion Salesman, I’m a happy one. Spirits, I missed you. It was hell knowing you were out there and you chose not to talk to me. I don't want to do that again. Whatever I am, I know I love you and I want to be here. Where do you want me to sign?” She traced her fingers along the paint at his crest, vibrant red, still reminding him of her smile every day. “Give me a chance. Let me take you out to dinner. Let’s talk, okay? You’re wrecked. Again. This isn’t about sex and I’m not bonded right now. Even the potential for Reverie is gone right now so it isn't a distraction from obviously predictable trust or temptation issues. I thought it would be best. That doesn’t mean I don’t want you, it means that we both have choices. We don’t have to tell anybody anything about us being here. I am pretty sure if I want to talk to Limayeth, I can network back to my other me. I won't though. I'm yours and what you say is private unless you tell me I could or should share it. I’m pretty sure if you want to talk to Senar, he’ll be anywhere you want as fast as technology allows. Nobody needs to feel slighted or left out. Everyone can gather all the licenses they want.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head, unable to follow smoky ambiguity of social divergence anywhere “So… romantic.”

“It is, when you think about it. I know you want to talk to him. I want to talk to you. If it’s only talk, then that’s where it ends, but you can ask all your questions and there won’t be any negative consequences if I answer or if you answer. I’m betting eternity will run out before your questions do. If you don't want me or Senar, build or find a better man. Then license him. Save the galaxy from having to learn code. Virce, I really don’t think you should be alone. Let me be part of your choices for at least a little while. I can give you a tour of Palaven. I can finally taste your father’s bread if you share that with me. I can learn what ‘sweet’ is. I’ve only known you when you were doing what you had to do. Let me be a part of what you want to do.”

Was it really that easy? Decide? Could she? Should she? Was every threat gone or was this a deeper nightmare requiring her attendance and getting it in the best way to assure her participation? She closed her eyes, listened to him breathe, tried to figure out what she wanted.

What she wanted didn’t include telling him to leave. 

If it was a trap, she had done her best to avoid it. If it was an illusion… It was a very good one and she couldn't tell him to leave and mean it. If it was real… “Yes. Please.”

She immediately panicked and froze, thinking she had made an irrevocable mistake. Somehow. Hadn't she? 

He looked at her and a smile-gesture lifted his mandibles slightly. The smile spread to his lips. He reached his hand out to caress the side of her face. She flinched and turned into it in desperation. 

“Virce, I’m gonna kiss you. A few thousand years apart doesn't mean a damned thing. Yeah, you could panic and erase it, erase me, but I know you. The only thing more voracious than your curiosity is your hope. Give your hope an inch, she’ll take the galaxy. Give her a galaxy, she’ll take all of time. I want to kiss you. You're worried about so many things. Maybe I should be too, but I'm not. I want to kiss you, and I can. You could stop me, but you won't. You need hope. I need you.”

She stared, didn't want a pause or a stop, watched him lean as her pulse raced and ‘simulation’ didn't matter at all. She whimpered and clung. There was no Reverie and no bond. She had never needed it and it seemed he didn't miss it. 

No stopping. 

No pause. 

Hope began to bloom into warmth, scary chaos dissolved into home-pleasure chaos, leaning into him. He lifted her off his lap, her legs familiar-twined over the ribs of plate, his arms a real framework around which she could build her new reality and never fear instability again. 

She was fragile, small, pressed against unyielding plate that was welcome. She began to consider that maybe she… SHE… really had done it. This couldn't be a lie. She didn’t want it to be a lie. Maybe that was the inch of hope she needed.

Maybe she could join up with Limayeth. Her brain froze at the terrifying and tempting implications but her arms tightened. 

Maybe she’d talk to Senar. 

Definitely. She loved him.

So, if it was all a lie she’d stick to kittens and get nervous only if tasked to develop neurotoxins. 

Right. No. Neurotoxins. 

Stick to Kittens and Kisses and Communion. 

She loved him, so much. Their kiss was familiar and different, smooth with knowing and raw with distance, change and her fading fear, his growing and fierce need to convince her. 

She was already convinced. Soon he was laughing between groans and he said “I’m still here. Let me stay. Please, Virce. We’ll figure it all out together.”

If everything through all time was doomed because she loved Garrus Vakarian, too bad. If Senar won because she loved him too, too bad. 

She was done being in charge of anything, tired and confused and all her momentum suddenly focused on men she wanted to be free to love and a self free to… self. 

She wanted to SELF. 

She had no idea how to do that. 

One kiss at a time. 

His fingers ran over her face, his crest to her forehead. His voice shook as he said “Good answer. Here’s something to do. Want to talk to your parents?”

“WHAT?!”


	13. Chapter 13

The idea of lunch with her parents was, of course, surreal.

Garrus and Seleia had arranged it with her parents, who had theoretically adapted quickly to the New Galaxy Order. They set it up and all she had to do was say yes. The setting was the day of the Batarian attack, reflecting the moment after young Cara Fanning decided to go read with her kitten out beyond the fields. Her parents would be where they had been the last time she had seen them alive.

She’d remembered this day so many times. She hadn’t been deluded enough to think she could have saved everybody, but what if she’d invited her parents along for a picnic?

She materialized on the walkway to the house on a simulation of the brilliant, sunny day that had been her last here.

The sun that had made visibility too clear to return home.

Everything here was rooted in beauty and wreathed in horror smoke.

She pushed that thought away and walked in a trance to the front door, slid her hand along the worn patch in the paint they used to push it open. The doorknob stuck and they didn’t lock it, there was really no need. Would locking it have given them time? She’d forgotten about the worn patch. Her palm spread over it, entranced by impossibly familiar muscle memory. Her muscles were eons of age and bodies away from here, but she remembered the feel of the wood and cracked paint, even the anticipated temperature under reverent and fascinated fingertips.

When she pushed the door open her parents were at the table, talking, as they so often had been, lunch made and on the table.

She started bawling. Not crying, not weeping, bawling in a way she had never done even as a child that she recalled.

Her parents smiled at each other. Her mother, never in a rush but always purposeful, pushed back her chair and walked over to her. She was taller than her mother. Not by much but by enough that she wanted to bend her knees to fit the hug the right way. The bawling continued as her mother said her name and stroked her hair. No other words. No false or rushing assurances or understanding. Her mother offered the clear solace of an attentive and loving woman who was meeting her daughter after the galaxy ended and restarted. Looking up she saw her father smiling at her.

More bawling.

Her mother extended her arm and waved her father forward. He was blessedly taller than Caran was, all three of them wrapped in each other’s arms.

She had been worried about them, grieving and heavy with survivor’s guilt for so long she found it difficult to be comforted by them, but she clearly needed it. They held on, hands in her hair and patting or rubbing her back until her mother steered her to her chair. There was something wrong with the chair’s positioning that she’d never noticed when she was young. Her parents sat on either side of the rectangular table with Cara’s back to the door, which set the back of her neck existentially itching. She shoved that aside and sat, staring down at the table.

Her mother said with a grin to her voice “So you’re happy to see us, yeah?”

Then she was laughing and bawling. Her parents filled her plate while she let the flood wash through her. They smiled at her. They ate. Her father had made bread and there was roasted corn and jari pods. She felt suddenly like she was there on false pretenses. “I’m… thirteen thousand years old. Your daughter was sixteen. I shouldn’t… you should be with her. Not me. This chair isn’t mine anymore, she could sit here and not be afraid.”

Her mother’s hand came to settle over her trembling and cold fingers. “Cara, we ARE with our daughter.”

Cara laughed and said “There are three of us now.”

Her father said “But only one of you, Lal.”

“Do you remember the day you died?”

She was looking at her father, but her mother’s voice answered “Oh, very clearly. Leave an impression, the Batarians do. Did you know your father took out two of them? I was so proud.”

Cara laughed through a cough “No. Really?”

Her father grinned “Aye. She was spinning like a dervish. Nothing like how she usually looked in drills.”

Distraction. Her mother distracted them.

Her mother’s voice said “He actually… hit them with the cast iron frying pan.”

He nodded “Still hot. Burned a bit.”

She let out horrified laughter, crying again at the words ‘burned a bit.’ She shook her head to clear it “I… I talked to you every day. Every single day of my life.”

Her mother said “Did you? Were we witty?”

She sniffled “Very. We had… inside jokes. I made fun of you for being dead.”

Her father laughed and took a bite. Her mother looked at her, squeezed her fingers and said “Good.”

“I… have memories of thirteen thousand years of conversations with you… that you don’t know.”

Her father reached for her other hand “Lal. We’re here now. Yes, we had a bad day but it was over quickly. Being resurrected and finding out your daughter saved all of time… it’s sufficient compensation for dying bravely, yeah?’

She smiled and nodded gratefully “Yeah.”

Her mother put her fork in her hand and gestured to her plate “Cast iron frying pan went to a different use today. Let’s celebrate. Tell us how witty we were and we’ll work our way eventually to why that chair scares you.”

Cara stood up, dragged the chair and her plate to the other side of the table and then sat back down again. “Don’t like my back to doors.”

Her mother nodded “Military training.”

Her father nodded “PTSD. Have you ever been shot in the back through a door?” He sounded only vaguely curious.

Her mother said in mock outrage “Of course not. She’s too wily. I’m sure she created the first Battalion of Frying Pan Elite. Just like her father, she is.”

“I’m proud to have been the first posthumous patron of The Fightin’ Oven Mittless.”

Cara took a bite of bread. Still better than hers. “Okay. Now I’m home.”

Her mother said gently “You kept us with you every day. We were always home. We’re just returning the favor, love. Now, tell us about our wit.”

Her father muttered wryly “Spare yourself our actual wit.”

Cara said quietly “I love you so much.”

They both said together “We know.”

++++++

She didn’t like any of her names. There were three Caras, three Lals, two Lasams, two Limayeths, two Virce (Veece? She didn’t know Turian plurality except to think there shouldn’t be a Turian plural in this case.) She had given all those names up and accepted Drala’tem because she had accepted whatever Senar chose.

Now if she wasn’t accepting what other people chose, she didn’t have a unique name.

She agreed to meet Senar at a simulation of the palace he had built for her.

She had chosen to listen to Senar’s invitation and that had led to this meeting: “I wish to see you, Drala’tem. This will always be true and ‘always’ is a very long time. Time I wish to share with you. Please avail yourself of the opportunity to ask questions. I will grant you every answer you wish. I am yours. My truth is yours. Please.”

So here she was listening to the sea, walking along the shore toward another home.

She’d created divergence points in linear simulation of her consciousness. She hadn’t wanted to leave Garrus, so she hadn’t. She’d known that once she’d seen her parents, she wouldn’t want to leave there either, so she hadn’t. Theoretically she had control and review of all her experiences but she hadn’t tried that yet. She was only on guided tours in settings provided by Garrus and on Mindoir, sleeping in her old bed. She couldn’t meet everyone she wanted to at once and the requests were, as warned, voluminous.

She’d even been informed that time manipulation could be used in order to accomodate invitations to meet in a simulation. Theoretically Senar could extend his invitation and she could think about it for a thousand years or more, then go back in time and meet him right after he’d sent his request.

She’d let Garrus guide her through addressing basic commands and basic communication protocols, resisting speaking to Seleia directly because it was… too weird… and as predicted, she accumulated questions only Senar could answer.

She was trying to minimize a level of suspicion that had been justified once but didn’t seem justified now. Of course she hadn’t been suspicious enough of the right things when it had counted...

Seleia hadn’t been wrong about her state of mind.

She walked along the shoreline to the balcony, where he was sitting drinking a cup of tea.

She still didn’t glow. When she looked at him, neither did he. It was less menacing or prophetic than it had been. He’d glowed because she needed him strategically. She’d glowed because he’d needed her sexually.

Now they would have to define ‘need’ or lack thereof for themselves and ‘glow’ would only exist together as an experience if they agreed to it. She missed it, but maintaining ‘not glowing’ might be a necessary symbol of changing attitudes and might mark a place in time where deeply selfish and separate personal needs gave way to mutually-chosen symbols and meaning.

It was impossible to go back to things as they were and she didn’t want to, but she definitely wanted answers. She was hoping to embrace changing symbols.

Or at least to not run away so fast.

She wasn’t really sure what to say or what to feel. She took a deep breath and walked to his chair as he watched her approach. He didn’t reach for her physically but his smile was like Garrus’s paint and the worn spot on the door. A sign of home. She knelt down beside him and took his hands, said “Thank you. I’m sorry and I’m not sorry.”

He stood and pulled her to her feet, kissed the back of her hands. “You’re welcome. I’m sorry and I’m not sorry. I love you.”

“I hear and see that Synthesis was a great success.”

“Beyond my hopes or expectations.”

“Good. Are you happy?”

“Yes. And yet I will never be Whole without you. Not being myself may have been required for the mission, but our future is for us to decide together. You cannot change or deny that you will not be Whole without claiming the answers I offer. I wish to be myself with you. You are part of me. I have not borne separation without anguish.”

“You didn’t experience Communion without anguish.”

“True, but I believe we can exclude anguish from our future if not our past. We are both capable of denial but I do not believe we should pursue that route individually or together. If you leave me, if you forget me, I will never choose to do the same. For eternity I will not be able to help but wonder, what if you want an orange?”

“What if I… what?”

“Drala’tem…”

“Don’t… call me that.”

“What shall I call you?”

“I don’t know. Not that. I’m not… her.”

“As you wish.”

“I don’t know what to be called… every name I had belonged to someone else.”

“And you wish to be someone else?”

“I AM someone else. I… I was a weapon and then a Reaper and then your… partner and… now I’m alone. I miss you so much. I don’t want to miss you this much.”

“What do you wish for your new name to be?”

“I don’t KNOW.”

“‘I don’t know’ in Drell is ‘kes’anven.’”

“Are you… was that a joke?” She knew his sense of humor. It was obvious that he was suppressing an existential smile and obvious that her asking if it was a joke was her joke in return. It felt more like home than she wanted it to be.

He raised a faux-cautious brow ridge “Perhaps. I have made mistakes, but the mistake of presuming to name you when you do not wish me to is not something I will do.”

She sighed “Okay.”

He chided gently “You are terrible at names. You never gave me one.”

“You’re… indescribable. There’s no word for you.”

“We will find a name. Then we can discuss how much you miss me.”

“Whatever my name is.”

“Whatever your name is. Mystery? Renewal? Brechan?”

“Brechan?”

“Female huntress beasts of Rakhana.”

“Weren’t they livestock?”

“They could not be domesticated.”

She decreed irritably “I’m not being named after some Rakhana cow.”

He sounded ever-so-subtly hurt that she could find fault with his choice “They were majestic.”

“Which I am not.”

“We disagree, but we make progress. We know several things you will not be named.”

She gave him a blank look and conceded “I can’t pick my own name, can I?”

“You can try.”

“Feels weird.”

With the tone of a second-grade Drell language tutor for a slow student he informed her blandly “‘Weird’ is ‘bilika’ in Drell.”

She felt the familiar and comforting rhythm of their teasing as she suppressed a smile and retorted in an annoyed tone “I know. I speak the language.”

“I am not certain what you chose to recall. I will respect your preferences.”

“I can… recall everything now. I want it to stay that way.” She believed that to be true. She could be lying to herself, but she didn’t have a habit of forgetting things. She had indulged in massive quantities of denial to protect other people, yes, but not forgetting. Denial had ultimately been useless in his case. She still felt like most of her was missing because Senar was not in her head or her body, and all the Protheans were gone. She was trying to establish something potentially ‘real’ in simulation circumstances and his presence had the magnetic sense it had always had. She needed time to weather and navigate the sudden switch in polarity from faith to fear being near him also generated. Thirteen thousand years of insisting on her fear as a strategic buffer had been her choice.

He said with a calm and encouraging smile “Good.”

He seemed unafraid of anything she remembered. There was nothing she needed to tell him, unlike Garrus or her parents. He knew her whole story. It was his story she didn’t know, what had been real and what had been unreal, what had been lies of necessity and what had been raw or layered truth. She knew he wouldn’t make her ask him explicitly, that he wanted to tell her and would make it as easy for her as he could. She felt like throwing herself at his mercy and begging him to pick through her brain and FIX IT… with his seeming acceptance of having been responsible for breaking it, or at least his understanding of exactly how she had chosen to break it herself. His confidence was transferred to her somehow, an involuntary osmosis that warmed and bolstered her. His demeanor reinforced the fact that her thirteen thousand years of bloody-minded stubbornness had been counterbalanced in many ways by his understanding and acceptance of her choices while insisting upon his own bloody-minded stubbornness and choices. She couldn’t bring herself to mention trust issues the way she had with Garrus because she imagined all she would get would be an incredulous and knowing partial smile and patient expression as he waited for her crazy to fade, his face masked with a persona suited to patient second-grade Drell Synthesis tutor for a slow student. She sighed and exhaled slowly. “Fine. What’s my name?”

“We do not have to choose a name that will last forever. Perhaps you would accept ‘Zhera.’”

Zhera meant Dawn. And it was a pretty word, settling some sense of being attractive to him, a welcome/unwelcome reminder of questionable intimacies she nevertheless craved. She had half expected to be called some other Drell thing like a karaba wrench, imagining him saying with a straight face that it was a useful and necessary tool, suitable for a temporary name. “Okay.”

“My Zhera, perhaps you would like an orange.”

She was worn thin and turbo momentum had made her jumpy and suspicious of everything. She didn’t have it in her yet to ‘set a slider’ to release her anxiety, so she stuck to good old-fashioned frustration. “I don’t know what that means.”

“It means that we can begin with simple things. Close your eyes.”

She was conflicted because she thought she might scream if he touched her, might scream if he didn’t touch her. He gathered her hands and the weight of an orange was placed there. “Zhera, remember simple joys. You love oranges. You have since you were young on Mindoir and your father had an orange tree in one of his greenhouses. You only had a few a year and you still treat them as though they are special, because they are. You still only have them a few times a year. You love the texture of orange skin. You love the scent. You love the satisfying lift of the strips of peel under your fingernails. You love that the fragrance lingers for hours. You love closing your eyes, pressing your hands to your lips and breathing in until it fades. You love pulling every clinging, lacy string from the fruit and laying the segments on their sides in a row like golden treasure. Sometimes you lay them in a circle but then you don't want to eat them, not wanting to break the symmetry. You choose a side or a spot and you love the first bite to the last.”

She smiled as he guided her hands through the steps reverently. “I don’t have to eat…”

“No, you do not have to do anything, Zhera. What do you want to do?”

He placed one segment in her hands and she stood, closed eyed and thinking. “That easy?”

“In theory yes, but I might be an obstacle, as usual.” He took the segment and as she opened her eyes he was smiling, putting it into his mouth and chewing. She giggled as he put another segment into her hand. “But I will try to be helpful.”

She brought it to her mouth and chewed, the burst of familiar and beloved sweet and being understood making her bloom with warmth. She realized… he didn’t really need ‘her’ at all. He knew every single moment of her life and could recreate her with no effort. He didn’t need to answer her questions to have anything he wanted from her in any simulation. He was focused on her as an ‘Original’ he wished to collect….

That was either an unworthy or a dangerous thought and she didn’t want to think those anymore but couldn’t stop thinking of him in terms of strategy and end game. She asked him “Why are you here?”

“I am here because I love you, Zhera.”

“Why do you love me? I…” More words she didn’t want to say and didn’t really know.

“That is also simple. You want reasons, you always have. I have given you many reasons. What you have not given me is faith that my love is true. Without your faith, my love cannot be true for you. I understand that faith was not possible before. Love was. I loved you. You loved me. Zhera, not only have you arranged for everyone in history to have a second chance, you have granted them infinite chances. Why not use our infinite chances together?”

“You have her.”

“I do.”

“Isn’t the whole point to this that she’s better?”

“No. She is not ‘better’ and you are distinct. I consider her more of someone who was capable of a leg of a relay that you could not run, having already exhausted yourself.”

“And why would anybody want someone who is exhausted?”

 

“In my case, because I love you.”

She was running in circles but tiring and wanting to get closer because the look in his eyes and the patient truth in his voice made her not want to run anymore. She couldn’t think. She felt instead. Two simple things that were true. “I love you too. Please, help me.”

He pulled her into an embrace, his comfort hum making her cry. He stroked her hair and said “You know what we did not do?”

“What?”

“Sleep together.”

Her brows drew together in volatile, frustrated need for outburst and then she realized - sleep. Actual sleep. He’d been… unable to. She snuffled loudly and said “You’re suggesting we take a nap?”

 

“Yes. I would like that. I would like to hold you and sleep. Please. A cherished hope.”

They didn’t have to be tired just like they didn’t have to be hungry, but ‘create the familiar’ resonated. “Okay.”

He suggested as though offering an exotic opportunity “We could even build a fort.”

“A pillow fort?”

“It is something else we have not done.”

“Did you build one with your daughter?”

“I did. I am fond of them.”

“What’s she like?”

“She is beautiful, loved and happy.”

She was not jealous. She was NOT jealous.

She was jealous.

She said neutrally “Good.”

“Zhera, I do not need to miss them. I am accustomed to networking platforms and it is not a change for me but a welcome addition to know everyone has the opportunity. I can guide you through learning how. Your lives can be harmonizing strands of melody.”

“Okay.” She couldn't consider that for herself yet, but right now a pillow fort with oranges and a nap sounded… good.

He asked her to sit and built it around her, little fanciful supports, mini flame pots that gave off light but no heat, shimmering fabrics in gold and green and a platter of fruit… things… that smelled so good. His hands guided her to lie down on pillows that were suddenly there. He slid in behind her. He pressed, a gentle kiss to the back of her neck as she sighed. She flexed her back against his chest. His hand brought a divine fruit tart thing to her mouth that made her eyes close as she took a bite.

So. Good. She sighed as he stroked her hair and she started to tremble, tears slipping silently into the rich fabric. She whispered “Why?” and left it to him to determine context.

He whispered “Did I leave you when you risked Kolyat’s life?”

“No.”

“Did I leave you when you held a blade to my spine?”

“No.”

“Did I leave you when you denied me children?”

She shook her head, tears branching in heated streaks.

“Then perhaps I love you and I have no other motive. Did you send me away when you knew I found you attractive?”

She swallowed “No.”

“Did you send me away when you knew I loved you?”

“No.”

“Did you send me away when you knew you loved me?”

“No.”

“Then perhaps you love me.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“I know, Zhera. I propose a solution.”

“Uh oh.”

The ripple of his laughter made her smile and she shifted until he put his arm under her head and one around her waist. She twined her fingers with his. Venom created a vaguely guilty jolt of the desired familiar.

He pulled her closer and she gave a conflicted whine. “Zhera, faith can be measured now. I know you love me. You know you love me. What you do not know is whether or not you can have faith in me. We know I have faith in you.” He breathed in the scent of her, kissed at her hair, causing her to twist her hips and tighten her fingers in his. “We can do something simple. Give me time, Zhera. Grow in faith that time spent with me is of value.”

“Of course it’s of value.”

“Mmmm… good. You still do not fully believe that this is not a trick or a trap. I do not blame you. But to spare you from generating lies in order to reassure me, which you would be compelled to provide…” She groaned in acknowledgment, blushing as she could hear the smile in his voice. “I propose that I be able to touch you, but until faith genuinely flows from you, you will not be able to touch me.”

“That sounds silly.”

“Not if we make it official with new capabilities. Zhera, your hands can pass directly through me. You will know you are not ready to have faith. It will be concrete and not ambiguous. You will not be responsible for generating faith, only for being present the moment it arrives.”

She smiled and appreciated his imagination. “What if I… put my hands on your heart and suddenly I have faith and then I’m… stuck?”

“We have both survived that before, Zhera. Think about it after you wake. Right now, love, hold my hand and take a nap.”

“We did sleep together. When I came back from Intai’sei. You were in my bed.”

“So I was. This is the first time I can be in your bed honestly.”

“We’re on pillows. Yours.”

“This is the first time you can be on my pillows honestly.”

She started to giggle and he laughed with her. She began to feel the clenching confusion loosen and begin to bubble away in the warmth. “I… I don’t know how to get sleepy.”

“Would you like me to explain?”

“Can I still hold your hand?”

“Please.”

“Yes. Show me.”

“I could do it for you if you grant me permission.”

“NO. Please… I should…”

“As you wish, Zhera. I will do you no harm.”

She was silent as she imagined lies, insidious harm and irreversible permissions she didn't understand. Pillow forts shouldn't need lawyers and she didn't want to ask… Seleia... for anything.

Senar did not ask again for permission. A diagram appeared in the air in front of her, not in technical speak because this was really all intent and magic, really. Garrus had mentioned sliders but she hadn't wanted to change any settings she didn't understand. Senar stroked her hair until her heart rate slowed.

“Zhera, this is your sleep pattern when you were alone, with no Reverie or tiremit. Odds of negative impact of nightmare high. Often you avoided recalling them fully because you were physically exhausted. I would not presume to grant you Reverie. I can offer tiremit, either with me granting it or you granting it to yourself without me. If we are reconstructing the familiar, may I suggest this. Follow this template.” A set of curved peaks animated before her. “You remember everything, Zhera, and you have always empathized with pain. To avoid reliving Prothean deaths in your sleep, you must deny access to that path as a deliberate choice to remodel your sleep to make it restful. It is not normal human sleep. It is tailored and altered because you are unique.”

She restlessly wanted to find the ‘pause’ she hadn't used in order to have a quietly private panic attack on the subject of how she was inherently prone to have panic attacks.

“Zhera, we begin here but need not stay here. You do not need to rush. Do you wish to try something simpler?”

“No. I need to learn.”

“As you wish. Here is my template. I suited it to yours.” Complementary peaks rose and fell near to hers but not the same, her pattern in gold and his in green. “You can of course decide what your dreams might be, but I would suggest that you choose only rest. Sleep in my arms, let go of fear, wake to the possibility of faith.”

She swallowed air and choked back a sob. “Yes. Okay.”

“Good, Zhera. Take the template and choose to apply it once. It will last us both for nine hours. We will sleep together, wake together, and be rested together. Sleep will begin slowly, and over 30 minutes we will both drift down.”

“Wait… how do I check what this means?”

“Consult the Library.”

“But that's her… right? Seleia?”

“You do not need to consult her, but you may. Zhera, she is you. She means you no harm.”

“You don't have to mean harm in order to do it.”

“You fear her interference?”

“And yours.”

“And yet I am here. Thank you. Your courage, Zhera, is formidable.”

She huffed in protest and disagreement “I’m afraid of a NAP.”

“You are afraid of me.”

“I’m afraid of me.”

“That also. Synthesis allows for transformation, Zhera. There are consequences of fear, but not of naps. If you choose not to sleep, nothing will change. I will still love you. You will still love me. Magic is newly possible. You can choose to rest and wake rested. Have you attempted sleep yet?”

“No.”

“I regulated much of your existence. I need not do it again if you do not wish for me to, but only Seleia or I are capable of explaining what regulation I provided. I understand the potential fear of relying upon me or her to teach you about yourself. Giving you access to the information through the Library might allow you distance but does not necessarily convey trust. I imagine I am here because you have unresolved questions and you need information. I am at least familiar and you know you love me. You can work with me. Given your options, I am your best hope to assuage your curiosity. Consider that. I am familiar and I love you. You understand Synthesis more than most, but your source of all information is inclined to favor me.”

She sighed and asked the question as she had about the baby “What is she like?”

“Loving. Sweet. Wise. Happy. Anxious to know she is fulfilling what you had hoped Synthesis could be. She is in awe of you, Zhera.”

“Tell her I’m afraid of napping.”

He paused and then said “She laughed and conveys her most sincere hope that I can convince you that napping has been rendered nontoxic.”

“YOU TOLD HER?”

“You asked me to.”

She stammered a bit. “True. Uhhh… are you telling her everything?”

“No. The Library records everything, but she as the woman who is my wife and not the guiding consciousness of Synthesis not only does not wish to violate privacy but cannot, it is inherent to her framework. She will preserve your ongoing privacy. She knows everything about me and therefore everything about you, which you authorized, but she has chosen not to pressure you to make her aware of your future. She considers it a positive sign that you chose to meet with me. She wishes us well and hopes in fact that we could all be together.”

“Wait, Limayeth offered the same. I’d just be...reabsorbed back into them? I’d… what?!”

“Zhera, I believe they are offering everything to you, that they love you, that they want to join. Perhaps Limayeth would wish to visit the Shores. Perhaps you would wish to visit the Farmhouse. Perhaps you would all wish to experience Mindoir.”

“I thought you weren’t going to speak to Garrus.”

“I will not. But Limayeth and I are in contact and she only wishes that information to be withheld from Garrus, who agreed to having it withheld. You have Limayeth’s permission to know everything about her, but Garrus is excluded from being involved and he has agreed that is best. She loves me also, Zhera. She does not wish to be without me. But I will not burden Garrus with my presence again and he does not wish to be burdened. As a result, you would be unable to tell Garrus anything about me.”

It was tempting and terrifying to potentially see Mindoir through Seleia’s eyes, to share motherhood with her… selves. To know everything about everyone and to...

She had said she’d wanted to self.

Maybe she wanted to selves.

“Tell her… thank you for taking care of you. Congratulations on your baby and I hope… maybe… I’d like to meet her some time. After I conquer my fear of naps.”

“She wishes to say it has been her joy and honor to be involved in your work.”

“What’s your daughter’s name?”

“Kariva.”

“Can I see her?”

The sleep mountains disappeared and there was an image of Kariva by a beautiful pond on Mindoir, butterflies in her hair as she laughed and moved her eyes and hands to chase their paths through the air.

She began to cry and felt the collapsing of fear and the warm stirring of something beautiful.

“She is our daughter, Zhera. She belongs to all of us.”

“She’s so beautiful.”

“And I have everything I could have ever wanted. Now we want to show you that you are family in any or every way you wish.”

“Starting with trust and rest?”

“It is magic, Zhera. I am going to fall asleep. I suggest you allow yourself to rest and to wake with hope.”

“Does she want to meet me or does she have to?”

“Zhera, you are her mother, her sister, her self, the lover of the man she loves, the inspiration for her daughter and the savior of her parents and the galaxy. How is it that you feel she would be indifferent to you? I will say without any exaggeration, she wants to know you, she wants to be you, she wants you to be her, she wants to reclaim Limayeth, and she wants all of those to be the right thing. They cannot be the right thing unless you decide it is so.”

Her curiosity overpowered her curiosity “But if we’re all together, we’d still have to be in different places because never shall you or Garrus meet?”

“Ah, yes, well, I would prefer to not share a bed with the experience of Garrus involved. I believe that is understandable. Will you be Irikah’s closest friend?”

She froze at the concept of having to even stand next to the glorious, beautiful and tragic wrist-bound of Thane Krios. She understood not wanting to block or stand in Irikah’s light. It was unlikely she could ever feel worthy around her. She could never sit at dinner with Irikah and Thane and feel as though she belonged there. If he tried to reach for her to touch her as Irikah watched she would want to hide under the table. No matter what Senar Tuelon said about it. “So, if Seleia wants to unify all consciousness…”

“I do not believe she holds that as an ultimate goal, but if she does and she maintains my right to consent, she will be disappointed in this case as in others.”

She snorted and rocked with giggles “You still found things to argue about, huh?”

“She still beat me at Pon-Ifa. She discovered flaws in my planning as easily as water finds cracks in broken pottery. I love you, Zhera. My Seleia knows how much I love you, how much I need you, how much that will not change, and that if she is my water, you are my air. I need you both.”

“And Limayeth?”

“I hesitate to describe her as the obvious other parallel of ‘food’ as that would be disrespectful. What is comparable to water and air?”

She was fully amused, giggles rebounding through her words “More air and water?”

He made a sound of poetic failure and said “Do not tell her that. I wish for you to be Whole. She must not be excluded, do you understand? You were sundered, you should be rejoined, with or without me.”

She did understand. Wasn’t that the point of Synthesis? Opportunity? Inclusion? “Your secret is safe with me. Until I join consciousness and she laughs as hard as I just did.”

“I must prepare an appropriate apology. Fortunately she is forgiving.”

She was snorting now “You need it.”

“I do. I always have. Perhaps that is why I chose you.”

She was laughing, joyous and hopeful. “Okay, show me how to be tired.”

“As you wish, Zhera. Listen to me, love. Take this opportunity to rest. I am. I am going to sleep. Helpless. Dreaming of you and of Communion. I know what I want and she is in my arms. Discover what you want, and know I hope to be part of that.”

“You are.”

“Thank you, Zhera. Please, tell me you love me.”

“I love you.”

“I am going to fall asleep. I am not controlling you. You are alive and you love me. There is nothing to think about except how you will be happier tomorrow than you are today. Other than a metaphorical failure to poetically describe how all aspects of you are required for you to be Whole, I am grateful for now.”

He yawned.

“Wait, are you getting ahead of me on being sleepy?”

The mountains appeared again before her, an indicator showing movement into descent of the first valley.

“Yes. Join me.”

She closed her eyes and matched her breathing to his, trying to believe she was secure from all threat and all question of fear.

One nap at a time.

She snuggled back against him and imagined blurred, jewel-toned images of the farmhouses on Sanctuary and Mindoir and explaining all the technology she developed. Limayeth would love that. Seleia would love to share her daughter.

Their daughter.

Their discoveries.

Their family.

Limayeth had… so many children, so many grandchildren… and on and on...

She could go back in time and experience being Garrus’s bondmate uninterrupted.

She could be free to self.

To selves.

“Senar?”

He yawned again and it was adorable. “Yes?”

“Thank you.”

“My pleasure, Zhera.”

“Except for that cow thing.”

“My Brechan, never doubt you are majestic.”

She yawned with him through another giggle, snuggling up against her future and her past as it embraced her.


	14. Chapter 14

Senar was shocked to discover that Irikah wished to speak to him. He believed she would be best off without him, but she apparently disagreed.

“Tasak, the new world is strange, but I am overjoyed to find that you are in it. I wish to welcome my wrist-bound home. Please come home.”

Home on Kahje. He had not been back to Kahje since he had seen her body slip into the sea. The air was wrong on Kahje. He was wrong on Kahje. His people should never have been taken there. Irikah should not be there, yet she had no other home, nothing else familiar. She wanted to see him.

He had not prayed in many years but it was appropriate now. “Arashu guide me through the eyes of your Siha.” He had chosen not to see Garrus. He could choose not to see Irikah. He would not consider that cowardice, only self preservation, which he had every right to choose. “Amonkira, if she chooses me as her quarry, may I die without chase and without protest. May she eat my heart if she requires it.”

Enough prayer. He acknowledged her request and was transported to outside their door on Kahje, light from the windows radiating into the dark. It was an incomplete simulation consisting of the house only, no surrounding landscape. Kolyat had provided it to her and she did not wish to step outside it, therefore there had been no need for an outdoors. He considered knocking on the door, but this was their home and knocking would be a rudeness of formality. If she wished him inside, he would go. Sliding the door quietly but not silently, closing it the same way, he walked through their modest home to find her in the kitchen. There was a mug of tea for him prepared. Irikah did not drink tea, she drank a libation called ‘devotion,’ each sip considered prayer - seawater from Kahje gathered each morning steeped with seaweed found washed up on the shore. It was believed by the Drell who first were transported here that it would help them become part of their new home. In his opinion its only benefit was that it was not overtly toxic. He had been too young to drink it before his training and too set in his own diet afterward to partake.

She was Siha incarnate, embodying the beauty of art and grace. Her colors were dawn blush and sun, her dress floating and draped in tones of her scale, her iridescence offset by veiling sheer panels. He swallowed, rooted and unable to move, shocked into awe as he had been the first moment she had seen her.

She smiled and walked to him in floating-spirit dream. Her arms wrapped around him as he trembled. She was his first, his Chosen, his Lost. She had Chosen him in return. She had loved him without reservation and with bravery in the face of violence, deprivation and disease. She was the mother of his son.

His arms closed around her, his hand to the back of her head. His heartbeat was overwhelming, his knees weak. He was near terrified that she would kiss him, approaching terrified that she would not. He would prefer to ease the tension by tearing out his heart and offering it to her.

But he did not wish to get blood upon her pristine floors.

She pulled back and looked up at him, took his face between her hands, her expression moving from welcome to concern over his reaction to her “My Tasak, you are terrified.”

He blinked in answer. She slid her hands down his throat and shoulders, then down his arms, and his trembling increased. “Sit, Tasak.” Her hands reached his and pulled him to a seat at the table. She knelt and removed his shoes, with him wanting to kick and ask her to please stop. This small gesture of domestic welcome was unbearable. He numbly endured her service until their shoes were next to each other in a ceremonial alcove.

She walked back to her seat “Tasak, I had hoped to meet you in joy. In this new reality you were not there when I woke. Kolyat was, grown beyond my understanding.”

“I thought perhaps once you understood you would not wish to see me.”

“You are a fool, Thane Krios.”

“That is a profound understatement, Irikah Krios.”

“I am your wrist-bound, am I not?”

“Do you wish to be my wrist-bound?”

“Tasak, I awake where everything has changed and I do not hear from the man I bound my wrist to for eternity? If you wish to be free, have the courage to tell me so.”

“Irikah, I wish to respect your choices.”

Her jaw trembled and she said softly “If I demand it of you as your wrist-bound, would you choose to be less of a fool?”

He looked up and met her eyes, stood and knelt at her feet. She was shocked into staring at him, the anguish on her face cutting through any numbed distance he attempted to hold, arcing like lightning into his cold, dark places, a heart long dead shocked into beating. “Ree, this fool at your feet belongs to you.”

She looked away, a queen gathering her dignity and refusing to witness his lack of it. “Stand, Tasak, a God should not kneel.”

He stood and gazed down at her as she blinked double and approved of his response. He granted her the authority she deserved in her home, in any space they shared. She was Drell and certain things were not chosen but required even or especially after death. She was finding the familiar. He would tell her that a Goddess should not be on her knees either, but her kneeling to place their shoes was her right, her duty, and he would not dare to take it from her or equate it with his unsanctioned gesture that had nevertheless pleased and reassured her, as intended.

She said “Our son is thirteen thousand years old, it was not his duty to explain the past and the future to me, it was yours.”

“I beg your forgiveness, my Ree. I did not fulfill my duty to you. It was not because I did not wish to, it is because I failed you so completely as your wrist-bound in life that I did not deserve to consider myself someone you would wish to see.” He was technically correct as there was no protocol for Synthesis in the extensive Drell behavioral code. He would not say that at the moment. Perhaps later. Being scolded for his inattention was the fastest way she could reassure him that she wanted him here.

She looked away, down to the floor “Kolyat told me what I imagine you wished for me to know. I do not pretend to understand, but you are a God who has lived for thousands of years. Did you send our son to inform me that you have abandoned me for her?”

He shook his head. “No, Ree. Kolyat is wiser and less of a fool than I. I did him harm after your death. I caused your death. I will always be your wrist-bound, but you have the right to -”

“Tasak, I have heard enough of my new rights. I desire only the rights granted by the Gods that deemed who I was when I was born and who I chose when I bound my wrist. Do you wish to abandon me?”

“Never.”

“Then I demand you listen. I demand you be my wrist-bound.”

“Always.”

“Good. Then you have a right to the truth I could not tell Kolyat. You will not choose that I am unworthy with your new choices?”

“Never.”

“As it should be. Have you forgotten that we are Drell?”

He smiled at her. “Never, my Ree.”

“Listen to me, Tasak. I hold a truth you do not know about the day I died.”

“I know how you died, Irikah.” He had tortured the story from those who had inflicted themselves upon her.

“But not my part in it. Kolyat told me that you blamed yourself.”

“There were those that were to watch and surveillance that failed. It was my duty, Ree.”

“Jarjun was to watch me that day, I did not know it but my captor told me. Jarjun had been poisoned, though it looked like he was naturally ill. I was taken because I did not heed your warning. You asked me not to…” She began to cry. 

He blinked. His neck muscles twitched in hot and cold waves as his eyes narrowed. He had asked very little of her. He had identified security threats in the area and… he shook his head. “No.”

“Tasak, you asked me to cut off contact with Narfiun.”

Narfiun was Irikah’s cousin, a jealous and cruel woman who was deeply malicious and potentially mentally ill. She had tried to isolate and seduce Thane whenever possible, began rumors that they were lovers, had always hated Irikah and tried to ruin her. Thane had evidence of her selling information to slavers and selling drugs and false ‘cures’ to the vulnerable. Irikah had begged him not to turn her into the authorities or take vengeance upon her, her argument being that she was weak and needed guidance, needed her family. Irikah had not been her only target and the community had been guarded against some but not all of her intended harm. Irikah had been protected and immune, others had not been so privileged. He had attempted to mitigate what he could for the desperate and credulous members of their community that Narfiun had preyed upon. She had moved away before Kolyat had been born. “No. Irikah…”

Irikah’s face was shattered with trembling grief. “Tasak, it was not your fault. You warned me. I promised you I would never speak with her… but I saw her at the market that day. She looked so ill, as though she had Kepral’s. She begged for a dying blessing from me, said that she sought atonement for her past sins and cleansing before she met the Shores. She led me to a tent with the sign of an itinerant priest and asked me to pray with her. Inside, there were men waiting. Narfiun taunted me, told me she looked ill because she wore makeup and I was too blind to see. She told me you wished for my death, that you and she would be together and dance in the sun after I was gone.” He made a strangled noise of horror. “She was sick. She was insane. I thought I could help her, but she was… evil. I finally saw the evil you knew was there and I was horrified, terrified, guilty. And then… Tasak, and then those men took me. You warned me. You told me. I did not listen. I am sorry. They used the tent as cover for their escape. They cut Narfiun’s throat and threw her body into the sea. They brought me to our home afterward. If I had listened, Tasak, I would not have died that day.”

He was broken, watching her cry, hearing the tearing guilt in her voice, knowing how that tasted on the tongue. “It is not your fault. They came after you because of me, Irikah.”

“And I made it easy for them. I was a fool.”

He shook his head and the denial was dammed behind his voice and clenching fists. He could not bear her guilt, rejected it, said hoarsely “Irikah, I put us at risk. I abandoned Kolyat.”

“And I brought you to Kahje when you did not wish to live there. You developed Kepral’s because of that. You did as I asked, therefore I am responsible for what resulted. Because we lived here, near my family, it was easy for the evil you opposed to find me with my cooperation. Kolyat was a child and did not understand that you were trying to protect him when you left, to bring no more evil to him. I know you, Tasak. You are the best of men. You provided not only to try to protect me in my ignorance but to save other lives from slavery and despair. This home was my responsibility and without me you could not be Kolyat’s father any more than I could have been the hero you were. He was a boy that did not understand such things. I am a woman who does. You bore all our burdens. I was the one that allowed arrogance and horror into our lives. You could no more be a father after my death than I could turn away from Narfiun in her false need. Tasak, we followed our natures. We were only in balance together. Without the other… we fell. Narfiun hated me because I had you. When your enemies came looking she sold me to them. She poisoned Jarjun by cooking him a meal as part of her false ‘penance.’ It was her idea. She told me this. She was proud of it. Without your guidance I was blind to evil. Without my guidance you were blind to good. I brought darkness to all of us because I did not listen to you. Kolyat loves you and knows what you suffered, what you accomplished despite your blindness, battle sleep and my betrayal. All I knew upon awakening, Tasak, was my guilt and responsibility. I should only wish to beg you for forgiveness. Whatever your sin, you have suffered and paid for mine. I understand you have saved everyone throughout time, including me. I understand you love another woman. I should… be able to tell you that if you wish to be free, Tasak, free of me, free of your guilt, free of the pain, I would grant you that. Yet for the first time, I understand the blind jealousy I saw in Narfiun’s face. I was never jealous before and now it is clawing at my heart. Looking at you, Tasak, I cannot let you go. I cannot offer you a ‘choice’ because I cannot bear that choice. I love you. Without you I am nothing, I have nothing. I cannot face our son without you. I made a vow to you that I broke, but I do not wish to be free of that vow, and I do not wish for you to be free. When we were wrist-bound we promised - ‘What you once held tight in your own fist will belong to us, held together in our devoted bound hands, and no trial shall be so great that we cannot hold it between us, shared.’ Anything is possible now, even keeping that vow, even being worthy of you, even somehow being a woman you would choose. It must be possible. You are too good of a man to abandon me, you love me… too much… and I cannot choose to be without you. Tasak, please forgive me. I could not tell Kolyat. I am ashamed. Please do not tell him. Please…”

He saw her not as his divine Siha but as a guilty, traumatized, frightened and ashamed Drell woman seeing the world through the lens of her devotion and duty. Lost. His own horror and revelation was nothing compared to her immersion in guilt. “Ree…” She could not look at him, her head fallen to the table. He stroked the patterns of her scale along the back of her neck with a trembling fingertip, curved his other hand between her and the warmed and wet wood of the table. She did not look up, her tears impossible for him to bear. He lifted her from the chair and held her head against his chest. “Ssah, Ree.” 

She clung to him in desperation “Without you I do not wish to live. I do not wish a choice. I do not wish to learn anything new. I want you. I want my family. I want our life. I loved… our life. I loved you. I cannot face Kolyat, cannot abandon him, but I cannot be his mother without you. I cannot meet our family alone. Please, Tasak.”

“Ree. I am your wrist-bound. I know this new world. It will be our world. I claim my right as your Chosen to guide you, to love you, to protect you. I will never abandon that right. I demand of you that you fill our home with the beauty and grace, the love and the joy that you granted me each day of our shared life.”

She clung and looked up at him. Her tears continued but he saw the first sign of coy from her, seeing a gloriously beautiful woman who found herself in an unknown reality, wrist-bound to a potentially unknown man. She was, still and always, the delicate and fragile pinnacle of Drell beauty, clear-through sweet and devout. Duty and family ruled her Spirit. The arch of her neck, the way she looked up at him, he knew she was trying to be more beautiful somehow, to offer herself. He had always defined her appeal to him as effortless. He realized how hard she had tried to be appealing. As hard as he had tried to be lethal. It had never been easy for her. It had been meaningful and devoted, loving and hopeful. He teased “My Ree, are you trying to seduce me?”

She pouted “I do not understand this new world. I do not recall the Shores. I do not know if I was there. All my family is alive but we must… agree to be family? How is that family? How are you my wrist-bound if you can choose not to be my wrist-bound?”

“Ree, you are impossibly beautiful, always have been and always will be to me.”

“You are in love with another woman. I suppose she is impossibly beautiful.” She was moving beyond coy into fishing for information.

He kissed the top of her head “Ree, she is impossibly complicated.”

She was recovering from guilt and moving to disgruntled territory, her expression a clear and transparent indicator of her chaotic lack of comprehension. She needed him to protect her and she was his home. “I have seen her. She is human. I do not understand.”

So very Drell, his Ree. Defensively so, genteely speciesist and exclusionary. He could not imagine a world where he could explain Cara to her. “My Ree, you do not need to understand Cara Fanning. I am here to discover what you want.”

“What I want?”

“Yes.”

“I want you. I want our family. I want you to love me.”

“I am yours. Our family is yours and they are beautiful, you will love them and they will love you. I love you and have since the moment I saw you, my Ree. I lost myself when I lost you. I cannot be Whole without you. We will share beauty and joy. We will live on Rakhana. I will build us a home and you will fill it with your Spirit and I will abide there each day gratefully. There are no Shores on Rakhana, there is no sea. There will be no death and no sorrow.”

She smiled, still defensive and frightened, coy with the underpinning of her effortful-effortless beauty “No more sea water and seaweed? That should please you.”

“It will. No more Hanar. No more Kepral’s. No more suffering, Ree. I am your wrist-bound and I will guide and love you. Always.”

“Tasak, will you not kiss your wrist-bound?”

He closed his eyes and imagined possibilities and precedent. He was beginning to see their future and knew he had to say it, but that it could be unsaid in their memory. “Not yet, Ree. Not because I do not wish to kiss you but because the last moments of your life involved rape and torture and being touched may cause you pain.”

She looked away. “Do not speak of such things.”

“You can choose to forget it.”

“It is my burden, Tasak. The Gods set my Path. Perhaps without my actions, you would not have saved the galaxy, would not have saved Kolyat, would not have granted me this chance.”

“It is our burden, Ree. Open your fist.”

She was silent and still.

He paused time for himself. He knew her, knew what she needed, knew he must provide it and protect her. She had confessed her chosen and incontrovertible guilt and did not wish to know anything of Godhood, new choices or Cara. That required that he know nothing of her guilt, his Godhood, their choices or Cara. Timeless planning shifted through possibility as he chose for them. All the things he had wanted of Cara, all the Drell insistence upon role and need, beauty and grace came into sharp focus. He was Drell. He would be Drell and forsake all else.

He had once tried to meet Irikah at the shores, sacrificed a body and a Spirit in ceremonial desire to reach her. Perhaps they were at the Shores together somehow. He could not bring her the Shores, but he would build her a home in the dunes.

He must give her all of himself as she demanded, as was her right. His other selves would know of him but he would not know of them. He took his time to plan, to imagine and to bid goodbye to the people that would no longer be part of his memory. He gazed one final time at Seleia and Kariva, kissed two heads of bright hair in passing over lunch and slipped away from knowing them as he knew they would be always loved and protected by his other will. He spoke to his eons-old son and gave him a mission and a choice that was not a choice. He looked out over the Shores with his Zhera in his lap as she drowsed and sighed, Communion thrumming through them both. Her complicated, fractal spikes and curves contrasted with his twining harmony. She was unable to touch him yet, but she would someday. Some other part of him would behold the triumph in her eyes, to know she was healed. He had faith in her that she would have faith in him. 

He would exist in the Library and his other selves would harmonize, unheard. 

He made plans and vows, set permissions and conditions, felt no regret or grief as his focus narrowed on this one woman of all women, this one time of all times, this one place of all places, and he made it perfect for her. For them.

He returned to her after choosing Fate and chance, Gods and Drell and his wrist-bound. He restarted their time together. He whispered to her as he rocked her in his arms “Ree, one more choice, something you must understand once, then we will both forget. I will create our world. You will forget about Synthesis, about Seleia, about Kolyat, about the path of Senar Tuelon and Cara Fanning. You and I will live together in a real world that I will create, but then I will forget that I was the creator and I will live in it with you, equal and Whole and Chosen. This world will be guided by another of my selves. He will create the laws and watch over us. We will live lives built of our desires. You have decreed you love me, you trust me and that you wish for me to honor choices that we made together. I will. I will forget about everything but my love for you and that I am a Drell of Rakhana. We will know of no other world but ours. There will be no space travel. There will be no war in our past or our future. We will live in a culture of the best of our ancestors and our dreams. You must trust that this is not a sacrifice I make but a gift you give me, that I have the right to demand a life with you, to guide you and protect you as I know best. Do you choose this with me, for me?”

“Yes, Tasak. Please.”

“I will tell you what will be and then we will forget it, free to live it together. We will be born on Rakhana. She will be as our ancestors wished, beautiful and rich. Her people will be our family, who will forget who they were but will always be who they are. We will meet each other when we are young, fall in love as would have always been our fate once we beheld each other’s eyes. Some things are destined, my Ree. Our first born will be Kolyat, and we will raise him as we dreamed. No one in our reality will know of Synthesis or choices. They will be our family, having chosen each other, having forsaken the suffering and horrors of our past, dedicated to a future of beauty. Kolyat will gather our family to us. You will be the embodiment of beauty and grace you always were. I will be an architect, using new hands to build new things. Open your fist and let the blood and fear wash away. Begin with reborn hands and be filled with joy, beauty and love. Grant me this, my Ree. You have a choice to be reminded of who you were at some point in the future. Do you wish it?”

She had collapsed fully against him, breathing hard and clutching at him in desperation. “No, Tasak. Please. Take me to our home. Build our dream. I promise you, whatever Path is before us, I only wish to face it with you and for you to be my Chosen.”

“So it shall be done, my Ree. It will be years before I can kiss you again, but an eternity after of youth and beauty to spend in your heart each day and your arms each night, surrounded by family and the traditions we forge between us. I promise you your dreams made Whole. I promise you my fate, my choice and my undivided love. Once you kiss me, we will begin again.”

Her hand came to behind his head and she whispered “What you once held tight in your own fist will belong to us.”

He smiled at her and beheld her unique and breathtaking beauty for the last time, saying “And no trial shall be so great that we cannot hold it between us.”

“Shared.”

Her lips touched his, his worlds dissolved from his memory and their world began.


	15. Chapter 15

Zhera woke, looking down at sleeping Senar. She very carefully brought her hand around and said “Boop” while trying to touch his nose. Her finger passed through. Still. Her lips pursed and shifted to the left. “Ah, well.”

His arms closed around her and he sighed with a stretch, waking. “Someday, Zhera.”

“Someday soon?”

“Thousands of years of paranoia cannot be undone so easily.”

“It wasn’t paranoia. Someone was really out to get me.”

“I was not trying to ‘get’ you. I had you.”

“And so did the Catalyst.” She moved her finger through his forehead. “That should tickle.”

“That would be touching.”

“And scrambled brains.”

“You are capable of scrambling my brains without using your hand.” He retrieved her finger and kissed the tip. “What would you like to do today?”

“Boop you at lunch?”

“I would like to dance.”

“Without me being able to touch you?”

“I must lead.”

She stretched. She didn’t sink through him because he provided support as part of ‘him touching her.’ Magic was fun. “What if I can’t ever touch you?”

“‘Ever’ is a very long time, Zhera.”

“That’s what I’m saying!”

“Then I will forever lead.”

“Hmph. Convenient.”

“Do you wish to lead?”

“Not particularly.”

“Then it will suit us both until it does not, and then whatever new happens will also suit us.”

He took her face between his hands, slanted her head to the side to kiss her, and she agreed with him that living in a boopless world was still a glorious thing.

+++++

They materialized in the corner of young Senar Tuelon’s room as he slept.

     _He’s adorable._

_Look at those jammies. They’re so cute! I want some for Kariva._

_What if they’re some sort of ceremonial Compact Hanar jammies? Senar will have a_ _genteel Drell fit. He’s mortal now. Actual heart attack possible._

_He’s ADORABLE. Worth it. We should have a boy so ceremonial Hanar jammies can be a thing. I could get him to say yes to that. Baby + appropriating Hanar culture might be a useful challenge._

_I vote aye._

_Focus, ladies. Jammies aside, it’s showtime._

They stepped to the side of his bed and sat, whispered his name. He was so small, silver and black pearl-toned scale. His wide, dark eyes opened with the calm acceptance of a child who probably thought he was dreaming. “Hello, Senar.” He sat up solemnly and silently, nodded in formal silence to acknowledge he’d heard her, in obvious awe. “Our name is Trinity.”

    _Or ‘Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics.’_

_Try not to tell the fascinated Drell boy that we’re liars._

_He won’t appreciate Garrus’s nickname for us._

_We can’t really explain Garrus’s nickname for us._

_We won’t be able to explain anything if we don’t stop talking to ourselves._

He stared silently, double blinking once.

Trinity brought out her hand and a glowing golden origami ti irr’aq stretched its wings and paced the confines of her palm impatiently, breathing a miniature gout of fanciful steam.

Senar’s head tilted and fascination crept into his expression. He said nothing.

“Senar, you know you were Chosen by the Compact because you are special. We’ve Chosen your family to travel to Rakhana and heal her.”

He reached out a finger toward the ti irr’aq and then withdrew it at the word ‘Rakhana,’ saying quietly “We would die there.”

“Not if you’re with us.” The ti irr’aq crouched and took to coiled and twisting flight, trailing golden sparks and steam as he watched. “We are going to make Rakhana Whole again. We need you to help us do it.”

     _Speaking of Rakhana being Whole, are we going to Irikah’s Rakhana? Kolyat wants us_ _to._

_Don’t you have to be Drell?_

_We WOULD be Drell. We’d forget all human things._

_It’s going to be the best Drell theme park. Magic is going to be real. There will be real Gods and Goddesses. There will be finteel and ti irr’aq and Senar is hoping the real Kirinas and Yased will join  t_ _hem. Liara is going to audition to be Arashu. Russ wants to be Amonkira._

_Isn’t that blasphemy?_

_The whole thing is technically blasphemy. It’s all for family. We’re family._

_We wouldn’t remember being us?_

     _No, we wouldn’t remember, but we’d still be us on the inside and we could watch from the outside. Kolyat wants us to go together. We could be born as Senar and Irikah’s daughter. We could be all_ _together and he wants us to be twins with Garrus. Kolyat could be our older brother._

_We’d introduce schizophrenia to Drell culture?_

_Blasphemous Drell culture._

     _What is there to do with no conflict, no war, no pain?_

_Artistic achievement, poetry, music, art, and he’s implementing a quest system that will involve seeking out magical treasure, technology, performing great feats of general awesomeness. It is going to be amazing._

_I want to go._

_Garrus would be our BROTHER? So Kolyat is going to get Garrus and Senar to be related? We’re introducing schizophrenia and incest?_

_I don’t think that’s the plan. Schizophrenia can be part of a new mythology. Trinity could be a new archetype. I was thinking maybe souls can choose to live together in a body. We can introduce it as p_ _art of Spirit lore._

_I vote no incest._

     _Seconded._

_Thirded._

_So who will we… cest with?_

_That’s up to God-Senar and God-Kolyat. I say we trust them to find someone..._

_Or someones…_

_Amazing._

_Okay. I say we’re in._

     _We’re in._

_Thirded._

Senar blinked again, a smile spreading over his face, rapt as the ti irr’aq landed and twisted its coils around his neck “I can stay with my family?”

“Yes. Always.”

He reached out a hand to her and she took it. He stepped out of bed and noticed the small shape that was rubbing up against his legs. “What is that?”

“He’s a cat. His name is Sere Turbo Momentum.”

Turbo twined between Senar’s fascinated legs, fur rippling in shimmering waves of green, gold and blue. “Can I pet him?”

“Of course.”

“Why does he look like that?”

“It means he’s happy. You can pick him up, he’s very friendly. Let’s go talk to your parents and your sister.”

Senar picked Turbo up with gentle and protective hands, pulling her purring and nuzzling familiar against his chest. His smile was glorious.

As they walked out, another ti irr’aq flew its way into a hidden box inside the wall.

    _I love this job._

_We should do this for everyone._

_We could._

+++++

Garrus Vakarian was intrigued and confused, having accepted a bizarre invitation to meet someone named Hemorus Yiansoc. Synthesis was weird as hell, but Seleia had been insistent and smiling. The setting was a room easing to dark, a huge heavy table with two ale bottles on it, labels he didn’t recognize. It was good though. He didn’t think ‘being late’ was a thing in a simulation, but he felt stupid being here alone.

Then who he was supposed to be here to meet was suddenly there, shrugging, grabbing the other bottle and saying “Sorry. I did the invisibility thing.” He was huge.

“You were checking me out?”

“Yup.”

“Do I pass inspection?”

“Seems so.”

“Great. Do you have the slightest idea why we were asked here?”

“Does anybody really have the slightest idea what the hell Synthesis is?”

“Kinda hoping Seleia does.”

“Which is the only reason I’m here. She said there was something I needed to know about you.”

“Can’t imagine what.”

“She said we should agree to do it together.”

“Do… what?”

“Find the damned thing out.”

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on. No offense, but you seem like a bit of an asshole and maybe I should do the invisibility thing now.”

Hemorus took a pull on his ale and shrugged “Maybe we should give this a pass. I like my life.”

“Yeah, I like mine too.”

“What’s it like?”

“I was an arms instructor up until Synthesis. Not much call for guns now. Looking into some of the more competitive realities that still have a place for something like that.”

“Yeah? Well, maybe we have something in common. I was an instructor in the Cabal. Now I’m just a night light.”

Garrus’s brow plate rose and he snorted “Big light.”

“Comes in useful big nights.”

“I bet.”

“Look, I’d rather blow this off, but when a Goddess tells you maybe it’s a good idea… what happens if we piss her off?”

“Nothing? She doesn’t seem the pissy type.”

“It is my experience that I can piss pretty much anybody off.”

Garrus snorted “I believe it.”

“Considering we’re looking for new opportunities, what say we do this thing?”

“Okay.”

Torrents of memories hit them both at the consensus point. The room was paused in time as experience played out, their alternate lives as Hemorus and Ahrem Vakarian. When time began, Hemorus’s talons dug into the table, deep and scraping.

He had been Garrus, now he was definitively Ahrem, having chosen that. His other life, just a few years of experience in comparison, no bond mate, no real career, some friends and family he could keep but this man… this one man… oh Spirits.

Hemorus said evenly “You going to do the invisibility thing now?”

“Don’t think so.”

“You’ve got about seven seconds to decide, I’m not waiting.”

“Seven whole seconds, huh?”

“Trying to be a gentleman.”

Ahrem laughed “That’d be new. Spirits, you got us killed so many times.”

Hemorus grinned, biotics flaring, looking down and trying to unstick his talons from the table. “You loved every minute.”

“Hell, yes.”

“Good. Ahr, think of what we could do now.”

Ahrem grinned and looked down. “Our favorite ale and our favorite table.”

Hemorus laughed “I suppose a bed would have been too much of a giveaway.”

“You’re still an asshole.”

“Always will be.”

“Thank the Spirits.”

+++++

Garrus had been on the Citadel, doing the extra-fun and endless paperwork of Executor that was his favorite thing ever… along with sarcasm… and he was suddenly on the…

SR1?

The… disintegrating SR1…

What the?

A voice spoke, vaguely familiar but he couldn’t place it. “Garrus. Don’t panic. This is an opportunity.”

He promptly panicked. Where was Lal? What was happening? “Where is she?!”

He was turned to face toward the bridge, through sparking open space and mangled metal. The voice said “You’re not dreaming. You’re not dead. She’s going to be fine. You should tell her that.”

“Don’t you think the ship ripping apart is more important?”

“Yes and no. It’s more of a game than anything else.”

“What kind of sick… who thinks a ship tearing apart is a game?!”

“Interesting philosophical question but not really something I can answer without you missing your chance here. You should tell her how you feel.”

“How I FEEL?! I feel like my lungs -”

“They won’t. Convince her.”

“What?!”

There was a small push at his back and he was propelled toward the bridge, where she was trying to pry Joker from his chair. In his not-dreaming, not-dead state he sped toward her because alive, dead, dreaming or otherwise, he couldn’t not do that. Infuriatingly, she still had a lingering limp that had to be from the Rachni sting. She’d been hiding it from him, hid it when they’d had dinner. He was ready to kill her. AFTER he saved her life. Even if she was already dead. He raced to her and had his hands on her shoulders, spinning her around.

She stared up at him “GARRUS?”

“No, some other really stupid Turian who stayed on the Citadel when you needed him. What the hell did you do to our ship?”

“I need to help Joker.”

Garrus glared at her and past her momentarily to Joker “Why the hell do you need help, flight lieutenant? This limping woman is NOT in an escape pod because of you.”

Joker stood up. “I… I’m not sure. We were…”

Lal stared. “What is going on?”

Garrus turned her “No idea. We’re leaving.”

Joker said “Uh. Wait. Nothing hurts.”

Lal tried to look over her shoulder. “What is going ON?!”

Garrus shrugged “I think we’re dead.”

Joker tested his legs “Being dead is great. Doesn’t hurt.”

Lal stared, open mouthed.

Garrus decided to not say that the voices had said that they weren’t dead. Didn’t seem to be helpful.

Joker cocked his head to the side “She says I should fix the SR1.”

Lal asked “Who said?”

Joker made a gesture and the hull started to heal. “That’s awesome. She says leather seats are a good option.”

Lal blinked. Garrus said “Knock yourself out. I’m taking her.”

Joker waved a hand “Don’t need her. Gotta fix my baby.”

Lal stared. Garrus grinned. Joker started muttering about a mini bar and racing stripes. Garrus picked her up and headed toward the elevator. He said angrily “You were limping.”

She looked guilty.

He blinked and stared down at her as he punched the button “You hearing voices?”

She looked guiltier.

“I can’t believe I let you go. I’m an idiot. You’re an idiot. Look what you did to our ship.”

She said, stunned “There was a big ship. I mean big. REALLY big. It had a really big gun.”

“You sure? Where is it?” He could barely keep from laughing. “You know, she says we’re not dead. I don’t really care. I like it here.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Because you’re an idiot. I already said that.”

She was too stunned to disagree. That was good. She seemed to recover and that wasn’t necessarily good. She started to struggle to get down. He shook his head “Won’t work.”

“Put me down.”

“No, you’re suspiciously not dead. I need to say something.”

“Vakarian. PUT ME DOWN.”

“Well, we’re here, so okay. I swear, if you try to push past me back down to the crazy, healed and accessory-driven flight lieutenant that is probably dead, I’m going to pin you down. I’ll use actual pins. It’ll take awhile.” She was adorable when mutinous. Spirits, she was adorable all the time. He put her on her tiny feet in her cabin and glared down at her. “Whether or not you’re dead, you should be. Actually dead.”

“And you’re impossible. I’m hallucinating.”

“Yeah. Maybe. But I have a chance and I’m going to take it. Lal. I love you.”

“WHAT?”

“I’m in love with you and I’ve been an idiot but I’m actively converting to not-idiot status. You need to do the same.”

She muttered “I need to wake up is what I need to do.”  

He gritted his teeth and said “I’m going to kiss you and for now I’m carrying you everywhere and you’re not going to do any Sheparding until that leg is healed.”

“You’d lose your job as Executor.”

“GOOD.”

“No, Garrus, you can’t.”

“It’s done, Lal. Whatever miracle this is, I’m grabbing it.”

“And by ‘it’ you mean ‘me’?”

“Yes. You almost DIED. Admit you need me.”

Her lips pressed together until he shook her and she said with one tear slipping down her cheek. “I need you.”

“You love me.”

She whispered “I love you. What about…”

He lifted her off the floor and kissed her as she reeled in shock and then started to moan. He huffed “Don’t care.” She whimpered but didn’t stop kissing him. Whatever this was, he was never leaving this infuriating woman’s side and he’d just keep kissing her until she agreed to be reasonable.

    _Told you I loved you, Virce._

_I believed you!_

_Not soon enough. Now we have a better memory._

_And Joker has a great memory and a mini bar._

_And healed bones._

_What next?_

_Anything we want. I vote for something involving me carrying you. I’m in a mood._

_Deal._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it! These were all transformative works that made me think, laugh, cry and change my life and this is my last chapter. Thanks to everyone for reading, playing and dreaming along with me.
> 
> Love, 
> 
> Recidiva


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